The functional resins with amino ligands are synthesized by the modification of lightly crosslinked poly(vinylbenzyl chloride-divinylbenzene) matrix with the following amines: 1-methylpiperazine, ethylenediamine, dipropylamine, 1-methylimidazole, 2-mercapto-l-methylimidazole, 1,2-dimethylimidazole and 1-(3-aminopropyl) imidazole. Two methods of the modification reactions were employed, the first one is the traditional heating of the polymer with either neat amine or amine solution in an appropriate solvent, the second method is heating of the reaction mixture in a microwave reactor. The resultant resins show different degrees of modification depending on the applied method and contain 1.61-3.68 mmol of ligand/g. The I-methylimidazole resin displays the highest affinity towards gold from ammonium buffer (100 g/dm(3) NH3 center dot H2O, 50 g/dm(3) (NH4)(2)SO4). For this resin, the sorption is as high as 15.5 mg/g and log K-d (distribution coefficient) value is 2.94. All resins are highly selective and they do not sorb copper amino complexes. These polymeric materials were characterized using nitrogen, sulfur and chlorine elemental analysis and FTIR spectroscopy. (c) 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.