Facile synthesis of 2,5-dihydroxy-1,4-benzoquinone glyoxal resin with high capacity and selectivity for uranium recovery in aqueous solution

Abstract

A novel resin (DBGR) with α-hydroxy ketone groups was easily synthesized via condensation of 2,5-dihydroxy-1,4-benzoquinone with glyoxal, which was characterized by XPS, FTIR, SEM, TGA, EDS and BET. Experiments show that DBGR has a good uranium adsorption capacity of 741 mg g−1 and a high selectivity of uranyl ion in the presence of competing metal ions such as Ag+, Ca2+, Co2+, Mg2+, Sr2+ and Cs+. Adsorption isothermal and kinetic studies indicate that the uranium adsorption process of DBGR fits well with Langmuir isotherm and pseudo-second-order models. Analysis shows DBGR binds the uranyl ion via C=O, O–C–O and C–OH functional groups.