The co-adsorption potential of metal–organic framework/activated carbon composites against both polar and non-polar volatile organic compounds in air

Abstract

Adsorbents with high surface area and diverse functional groups are regarded as an effective option to deal with volatile organic compounds with different polarities. Herein, a metal–organic framework-199 (MOF-199 (prototypical Cu-MOF))/powdered activated carbon (PAC) composite (MOF-199@PAC) was fabricated and utilized to simultaneously treat multiple VOC system consisting of both non-polar (i.e., benzene) and polar VOCs (i.e., methyl ethyl ketone (MEK)). Kinetic and isotherm models combined with density functional theory simulations were also employed to address the adsorption mechanism of different VOCs onto the MOF-199@PAC composite (e.g., relative to pristine PAC and MOF-199). The overall results suggest that the MOF-199@PAC composite should be used efficiently for the adsorptive removal of polar (e.g., MEK) and non-polar VOCs (e.g., benzene) on its surface with the aid of abundant π-π conjugated sites and polar groups, respectively.