Simultaneously Remove and Visually Detect Ce4+ Based on Nanocomposite of UiO-66-NH2/CPA-MA

Effective strategies to deal with rare earth pollution are urgently needed due to the overexploitation of rare earths resource. In this study, a novel nanocomposite of UiO-66-NH2/CPA-MA denoted as UA was successfully synthesized, which can simultaneously remove and detect Ce4+ in water. The hybrid consists of UiO-66-NH2 and CPA-MA. Based on the high adsorption performance of UiO-66-NH2, it can remove Ce4+ with high capacity by adsorption. Moreover, it can change its color from olive drab to light cyan depending on the adsorbed Ce4+ concentration, and the chroma is linearly related to the Ce4+ concentration. So, UA can be used to qualitatively and quantitatively detect Ce4+ by its color changing. The kinetics of adsorption course was investigated in details. The anti-inference ability of the nanocomposite in coexisting systems was carefully evaluated. The results indicate that UiO-66-NH2/CPA-MA is highly potential to deal with Ce4+ pollutions due to its bifunctionality.