Abstract
In this work, fullerene (C60) was selected as a model carbon nanomaterial, humic acid (HA) as the model natural organic matter and bisphenol A (BPA), as a moderate hydrophobic organic contaminant. The effects of ionic strength, concentration of organic matter and of the pH over the adsorption of BPA on C60 were studied, as well as the competition between the BPA and the HA at the active sites of the C60. A possible adsorption mechanism was proposed as well as an attempt to study the sorption process in real environmental samples with characteristics alike to the optimum ones found in the synthetic samples studied.
Highlights
Understanding the interactions between carbon based nanomaterials (Mauter & Elimelech, 2008) and organic and inorganic contaminants (Hou et al, 2017) in welldispersed solutions is helpful to follow their transport in aquatic environments
Fullerene C60 occurs naturally, so it is important to study them as suitable models for other carbonaceous sorbents, which can be applied in the management of organic and inorganic pollutants (Kah, Zhang, & Hofmann, 2014)
Sorption of organic contaminants to the C60 surface is driven by the same factors that influence sorption energies in conventional systems, such as: hydrophobicity, dispersion properties and weak polar forces, the π-π bond being shown to be the dominant interaction for the adsorption of aromatic organic chemicals on C 60 (Keiluweit & Kleber, 2009)
Summary
Understanding the interactions between carbon based nanomaterials (Mauter & Elimelech, 2008) and organic and inorganic contaminants (Hou et al, 2017) in welldispersed solutions is helpful to follow their transport in aquatic environments The effect of humic acid (HA) and of the ionic strength (Huffer, Sun, Kubicki, Hofmann, & Kah, 2017) over BPA sorption on fullerene C60 were investigated, being observed that electrostatic and hydrophobic interactions represent the main adsorption mechanisms (Yang, Li, Chen, Zhang, & Xing, 2016). The less environmental damaging method of dispersion was chosen, involving a long-term mixing of C60 in water for a period of days, without the presence of organic solvent (Hyung & Kim, 2009) Due to this tendency to form stable suspensions, nC60 can be readily available in natural systems and its behaviour in aqueous systems must be studied.
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