Abstract
Pollution of drinking water by toxic heavy-metal ions is a matter of concern worldwide. These ions occur naturally, and also from environmental spills, radioactive wastes and other industrial waste. Arsenic and lead are typical examples. A novel green surfactant, purpose designed, and environmentally friendly is shown to be extremely effective and specific for heavy metal ion removal. This is a considerable step forward on previous technologies. Surfactants have been used universally to remove organic and inorganic contaminants from water. But little selectivity has been achieved. After usage, the residual surfactants are discharged into surface waters or sewage systems. This causes environmental pollution. In this review, three surfactants from different classes (novel green surfactant, synthetic chemical surfactant and biosurfactant) are compared in terms of their efficiency in flotation, removal of different heavy-metal ions, biodegradability, and toxicity level, including their advantages and disadvantages.
Highlights
Low but toxic amounts of heavy metal ions like arsenic occur naturally in drinking water
The results observed for ion flotation of copper ions at 500 mg/L indicates that using the S-octanoyl-cys causes this colour to rapidly disappear, which confirms that the ion-flotation process should be directed towards the development of novel treatment methods for the removal of heavy-metal ions, such as Cu, from mining wastewater
Biosurfactants are known as ecosystem friendly compounds, which are found in plants, animals, and microbes etc
Summary
Low but toxic amounts of heavy metal ions like arsenic occur naturally in drinking water Similar environmental issues of increasing concern are: wastewater from mining operations, battery and electronic manufacturing, the paper industry, radioactive waste disposal, which all pose massive challenges The discharge of such waste waters into rivers and lakes affect aquifers, discharge into the ocean and can cause serious problems to marine life and to public health.[1,2]. There are evolving stricter environmental regulations due to increasing concern about traditional surfactants which create health and environmental /water pollution issues Our goal in this search for green surfactants that are ion specific is made easier in that Nature has already shown the way. There are myriad examples of active sites within enzymes that bind specific, usually divalent, ions that can serve as guides to templates that suggest prototypes for novel synthesised surfactant head groups
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