Metal uptake by a novel bidentate thiosemicarbazide chelating polymer

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1-Cyanoethanoyl-4-acryloyl thiosemicarbazide (CEATS) has been prepared and polymerized by a free radical mechanism. The polymer PCEATS has chelating affinity, and metal-uptake capacities were determined for the chlorides of Co(II), Ni(II), Cu(II), Zn(II) and Cd(II) in the pH range 1.04–6.0. The extraction experiments show high capacity for Cu(II), (0.26 mmol/g) at pH 5.34 and lower uptake capacities for the other divalent metal ions around pH 5 in buffered solutions, under noncompetitive conditions. However, competitive experiments, performed with solutions containing a mixture of metal chloride salts and acetate buffer, showed a high selectivity for Cu(II) and Cd(II) over other cations. Distribution coefficients determined for the polymer and the metal ions indicate that the Cu(II) complex is more stable than the Cd(II) are and suggest that the stability of the complex decreases rapidly with decreasing pH. Kinetic experiments have shown that uptake of Cu(II), is slow, with t 0.5 = 10 h. Ligand regeneration experiments for Cu(II)-loaded PCEATS performed with 2.00 M H2SO4 have shown that the capacity for Cu(II) stays at the same level after several cycles of consecutive loading and stripping, indicating that the polymer is chemically stable. ESR spectra of Cu(II)–CEATS resin show that there are two different coordination complexes present in the polymer. IR spectra of the Cu(II) complex confirms the bidentate behavior (S, O; N, O) of CEATS and PCEATS (it is supposed that the cations bridge vicinal CEATS ligands through S, O and N, O atoms); the acetate group completes the octahedral coordination. The obtained data suggest that the polymer behaves as a bidentate ligand via the thiocarbonyl, carbonyl and imide groups. PCEATS and its complexes have an inhibitory effect on both the bacterium Azotobacter and the fungus Fusarium oxysporium. The effect on the microorganisms is proportional to the amount of free ligand in the complex.