Preparation of porous cellulose beads with ionic liquid mixed solvent

Aiming at the limitation of cellulose dissolution with the traditional methods, microcrystalline cellulose was dissolved in the mixed solvent of 1-buthy-3-methylimidazolium chloride (BmimCl) and 1, 3-dimethyl-2-imidazolidinone (DMI). Porous cellulose beads were prepared with the method of water-in-oil suspension regeneration. The influences of solvent proportion on the dissolubility of cellulose and bead preparation were investigated. Physical properties of the beads were characterized, and the cellulose beads showed good sphericity, porosity, pore diameter and specific surface area. Furthermore, cellulose beads were functionalized to prepare anion exchanger and good adsorption performance was found. The results indicated that the developed method has the advantage of process robustness and can be used as a new method to prepare cellulose matrices for the chromatographic separation.