Abstract
Magnetic carbonaceous nanomaterials are needed in water treatment applications because they can offer both carbon surfaces for sorption of organic pollutants and ease of material magnetic retrieval for regeneration and reuse. In this study, we employed a facile one-step method to synthesize a black carbon-magnetite composite (BC-Mag) by high-temperature annealing of black carbon and hematite. The nanocomposite was easily dispersed and stable in water owing to the presence of negatively charged oxygen surface functional groups. Sorption kinetics with dissolved carbamazepine showed a rapid initial uptake with equilibrium achieved within only minutes. The sorption extent can be described with the Freundlich model, and surface area normalized sorption affinity was an order of magnitude greater than conventional granular activated carbon. The sorption extent of neutral carbamazepine remained constant between pH 2–10 while surface zeta potential decreased. BC-Mag can be reused for the sorption of carbamazepine up to six times without significant loss of the sorption extent.
Highlights
Water and wastewater treatment strategies often employ adsorption technologies for the removal of organic, inorganic, and metallic pollutants [1,2,3]
The black carbon primary particles had an average size of 12 ± 5 nm with a fairly narrow size distribution and smaller than most of the embedded iron minerals which had an average size of 42 ± 33 nm and a broader size distribution
black carbon-magnetite composite (BC-Mag) when suspended in solution had an effective diameter of 457 ± 13 nm as measured by dynamic light scattering (DLS), but the size distributions reveal most of the composite particles to have sizes in the 240–270 nm range and a smaller population at 750–840 nm
Summary
Water and wastewater treatment strategies often employ adsorption technologies for the removal of organic, inorganic, and metallic pollutants [1,2,3]. Carbonaceous sorbents hold strong affinities for organic micropollutants owing to their strong abilities to form hydrophobic and aromatic interactions [4,5,6,7]. Recent advances in carbonaceous sorbents have been to incorporate nanotechnology features and fine-tuning of carbon surfaces for enhanced reactivity [8,9]. Nanometer-sized features of carbon sorbents can provide significantly high specific surface areas and chemically tunable surfaces (aromatic carbon Csp, aliphatic carbon Csp, or functional groups) available for contaminant sorption [10,11]. The graphene structure in the form of carbon nanotubes and graphene nanosheets has shown superior performance compared to activated carbon for the removal of organic micropollutants [12,13]. More disordered forms of carbon that have been evaluated as alternative sorbents include biochar, coal, and soot [14,15]
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