Uranium adsorption studies on hydrothermal carbon produced by chitosan using statistical design method

Abstract

A new hydrothermal cross-linking chitosan (HCC) was prepared by hydrothermal reaction at a mild temperature (180 °C) to diminish the solubility in acid solution, and the amine groups were almost retained during the hydrothermal reaction characterized by FT-IR and the dissolution rate in pH 3 solution decreased from 89.6 to 12.6 %. The effects of initial pH, contact time, initial concentration and temperature on the sorption capacity are discussed using 24 full-factorial central composite design using response-surface methodology. The HCC showed the highest uranium sorption capacity at initial pH of 7.92 and contact time of 273.6 min with 24 full-factorial central composite design and the maximum adsorption capacity was 273 mg/g. The adsorption process could be well defined by the Langmuir isotherm and the thermodynamic parameters, ∆G°(298 K), ∆H° and ∆S°, demonstrated shown that the sorption process of U(VI) onto HCC was feasible, spontaneous and endothermic in nature.