A novel nanocomposite of magnetic molecularly imprinted polymer (MMIP)/graphene oxide (GO), MMIP@GO, was prepared from mixture of acrylamido-2-methyl-1-propanesulfonic acid (AMPS) as functional monomer and ethylene glycol diacrylate (EGDA) as cross-linker in the presence of acrylate-functionalized Fe3O4 nanoparticles, GO, and Rivastigmine (RIV) as template. MMIP@GO was fully characterized by FT-IR, TGA, SEM, VSM, SEM-EDS, and XRD techniques. The swelling behavior of MMIP@GO, its recognition, and selectivity for RIV and a structural analog were tested and compared with the magnetic non imprinted polymer (MNIP). The adsorption mechanism of RIV by MMIP@GO followed the Langmuir model with the maximum capacity of 71.41 mg g(-1), the kinetic data were well fitted to pseudo-first-order model, and the selectivity factor (epsilon) was 1.98 comparing to the MNIP@GO. In vitro release of RIV showed dependence on the network structure of hydrogels and the pH values (2.2-9.0). The maximum release was 74% at pH 9 after 7 days. (C) 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.