Abstract
Removal of contaminants in wastewater, such as heavy metals, has become a severe problem in the world. Numerous technologies have been developed to deal with this problem. As an emerging technology, nanotechnology has been gaining increasing interest and many nanomaterials have been developed to remove heavy metals from polluted water, due to their excellent features resulting from the nanometer effect. In this work, novel nanomaterials, including carbon-based nanomaterials, zero-valent metal, metal-oxide based nanomaterials, and nanocomposites, and their applications for the removal of heavy metal ions from wastewater were systematically reviewed. Their efficiency, limitations, and advantages were compared and discussed. Furthermore, the promising perspective of nanomaterials in environmental applications was also discussed and potential directions for future work were suggested.
Highlights
Water is one of the most important natural resources in the world, which is vital for the survival of all living beings and the development of humans
Heavy metals can exert adverse effects on the environment and other ecological receptors, as they cannot be degraded by microorganisms once they are released into the environment, on the contrary, they will accumulate through the food chain
The results indicated that the functionalized silica nanospheres possessed enhanced adsorption capacities towards Cu (II) and methylene blue compared with the amino functionalized nanosilica
Summary
Water is one of the most important natural resources in the world, which is vital for the survival of all living beings and the development of humans. Nanomaterials often exhibit some special properties, such as a surface effect, small size effect, quantum effect, and macro quantum tunnel effect [21] These properties contribute to their extraordinary adsorption capacity and reactivity, both of which are favorable for the removal of heavy metal ions. In other reviews covering different kinds of nanomaterials, such as in the work of Wang et al, some nanomaterials for heavy metal removal including the carbon-based nanomaterials, metal/metal oxides nanoparticles, and polymer-supported adsorbents were reviewed [27]. These nanomaterials have shown their great potential for wastewater treatment due to their high adsorption capacity and selectivity, this review was not that comprehensive. The perspective of nanomaterials in heavy metal water treatment and the suggestion for future research direction are discussed
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