Investigation of graphene oxide nanoparticle adsorbent in removal of amoxicillin and ciprofloxacin from aqueous solutions
Subject Areas :
Payam
Bahar
1
(PhD Candidate in Environmental Engineering, Islamic Azad University, Science and Research Branch, Tehran, Iran)
Amir Hessam
Hassani
2
(Department of Environmental Engineering, Faculty of Natural Resources and Environment, Science and Research Branch, Islamic Azad university , Tehran, Iran)
Homayon
Ahmad Panahi
3
(Department of Chemistry, Central Tehran Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran)
Elham
Moniri
4
(Department of Chemistry, Varamin-Pishva Branch, Islamic Azad University, Varamin, Iran)
Keywords: Adsorption, Graphene oxide, Amoxicillin, Pharmaceutical compounds,
Abstract :
The presence of antibiotics in water resources as emerging contaminants can ultimately have health hazards. In the present study, graphene oxide adsorbent was synthesized using the Hummer method and used to adsorb amoxicillin and ciprofloxacin. The effect of various variables such as pH, adsorbent dose, concentration of pharmaceutical compounds and reaction time on the removal of amoxicillin and ciprofloxacin was investigated. Examination of the structural characteristics of synthesized graphene oxide shows that the specific surface area of the adsorbent is 9.7 square meters per gram and the average size of the pores in the graphene oxide adsorbent is 16.5 nm. pHzpc was also tested for the synthesized adsorbent and its value was 3.8. The effect of pH shows that graphene oxide adsorbent has the highest absorption of amoxicillin at pH 3 and ciprofloxacin at pH 5. Under optimal process conditions, the results show that in a duration of 60 minutes and a dose of 50 mg/L of graphene oxide and 10 mg/L of pharmaceutical compounds, finally 79.3% and 84.6% for amoxicillin and ciprofloxacin are removed, respectively. It can be concluded that the proposed adsorbent can be effective for the elimination of pharmaceutical compounds and is very promising for the molecular separation of antibiotics.
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