The greatest challenge of wastewate

The greatest challenge of wastewater treatment is the removal of trace concentrations of persistentmicropollutants in the presence of the high concentration of effluent organic matter (EfOM). Micropollutant removal bysorbents is a common practice, but sorbent employment is often limited because of fouling induced by EfOM and challengingsorbent regeneration. We directly addressed these two issues by designing regenerable dual-site composite sorbents based onpolymerized β-cyclodextrin, modified with a cationic group (pCD+) and adsorbed to montmorillonite (pCD+-MMT). Thisdual-site composite was tailored to simultaneously target an emerging micropollutant, bisphenol A (BPA), through inclusion inβ-cyclodextrin cavities and target anionic EfOM compounds, through electrostatic interactions. The removal of BPA fromtreated wastewater by the composite was not compromised despite the high removal of EfOM. The composites outperformedmany recently reported sorbents. Differences in composite performance was discussed in terms of their structures, ascharacterized with TGA, XRD, BET and SEM. The simultaneous filtration of BPA and EfOM from wastewater by pCD+-MMTcolumns was demonstrated. Furthermore, successful in-column regeneration was obtained by selectively eluting EfOM andBPA, with brine and alkaline solutions, respectively. Finally, the composites removed trace concentrations of numerous highpriority micropollutants from treated wastewater more efficiently than commercial activated carbon. This study highlights thepotential to design novel dual-site composites as selective and regenerable sorbents for advanced wastewater treatment.