Multifunctional Porous and Magnetic Silicone with High Elasticity, Durability, and Oil-Water Separation Properties.

Frequent oil spills and industrial emissions of organic solvents cause serious environmental problems. Therefore, finding a high-performance absorbent material is necessary but also challenging. Here we present a very simple method to fabricate a magnetic porous silicone that exhibits excellent absorbency, fast magnetic responsiveness, high elasticity, stretchability, and high chemical stability. The porous silicone instantly adsorbs any oil floating on water in a complex environment under magnetic field driving, without human operation, and can also separate the oil/water mixture automatically and quickly at high efficiency using an external pump. The oil absorption capacity and mechanical properties, such as compressibility and stretchability, were robust even under corrosive conditions or UV exposure. The robust, reusable magnetic porous silicone is a promising candidate for the large-scale industrial separation of organic solvents/water mixtures in harsh conditions.