Abstract
Corn stalk is the amplest and inexpensive organic material in Heilongjiang province, China. This resource is vicious, causing pollution of the environment. In this present study, an adsorbent is prepared by corn stalk fermentation with Aspergillus niger. The fermentative effects of water content ratio, initial pH medium, temperature, and time were addressed. The analysis of factors and orthogonal experiments revealed that the optimum conditions of producing cellulose were solid-liquid ratio of 1 : 5, temperature 28°C, initial pH, and 72 hours. The modification mechanism was investigated by using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The biosorption capacity of fermented corn stalk was better than that of raw corn stalk under identical conditions, and this improvement can be ascribed to the enzyme system secretion by A. niger under changing the surface properties of the raw corn stalk. Some of the hydroxyl and carboxyl groups are bounded by cellulose which became free hydroxyl and carboxyl groups with a high ability after adsorption of heavy metals.
Highlights
Heavy metal discharge causes serious environmental problem due to non-biodegradability
Many studies have focused on the use of agricultural and food industry waste, such as pine cones, shells and powder [9], almond shells [10], tomato waste [11], and Acidosasa edulis shoot shells [12] but biosorbents remove heavy metals from polluted water
Aspergillus niger was isolated from nature, the spore suspension was prepared by washing the aerial mycelium with water, and concentration was adjusted up to 106 cfu/ml. e spore concentration of the final suspensions was determined by counting in hemocytometer
Summary
Heavy metal discharge causes serious environmental problem due to non-biodegradability. Copper is widely being used in industrial applications, but its removal and recovery from wastewater is necessary for protection of the environment as well as human health [1,2,3] Several methods, such as chemical precipitation, coagulation, electrochemical treatment, membrane separation, solvent extraction, and ion exchange are available for the treatment of metal-bearing effluents and were applied to reduce the copper concentration of wastewater [4,5,6,7]. Agricultural discard, especially corn stalk (corn is a major crop in Heilongjiang province, providing grain reserves, feed, and industrial raw materials) is an important part of agricultural straw in Heilongjiang province Another abundant straw waste, rice, was chemically modified and studied as a biosorbent by Vafakhah et al [13]. Functional groups on the cell wall of biomaterials such as corn stalk, include hydroxyl, carboxyl, carbonyl, and amine with a high affinity
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