Highly Efficient and Reusable Montmorillonite/Fe₃O₄/Humic Acid Nanocomposites for Simultaneous Removal of Cr(VI) and Aniline

Haijiao Lu; Jingkang Wang; Fei Li; Xin Huang; Beiqian Tian; Hongxun Hao

doi:10.3390/nano8070537

Highly Efficient and Reusable Montmorillonite/Fe₃O₄/Humic Acid Nanocomposites for Simultaneous Removal of Cr(VI) and Aniline

Nanomaterials (Basel). 2018 Jul 17;8(7):537. doi: 10.3390/nano8070537.

Authors

Haijiao Lu^{1

2

3}, Jingkang Wang^{4

5

6}, Fei Li^{7

8

9}, Xin Huang^{10

11

12}, Beiqian Tian^{13

14

15}, Hongxun Hao^{16

17

18}

Affiliations

¹ School of Chemical Engineering and Technology, Tianjin University, Tianjin 30072, China. luhaijiao@tju.edu.cn.
² State Key Laboratory of Chemical Engineering, Tianjin University, Tianjin 30072, China. luhaijiao@tju.edu.cn.
³ Collaborative Innovation Center of Chemical Science and Engineering, Tianjin 30072, China. luhaijiao@tju.edu.cn.
⁴ School of Chemical Engineering and Technology, Tianjin University, Tianjin 30072, China. jkwang@tju.edu.cn.
⁵ State Key Laboratory of Chemical Engineering, Tianjin University, Tianjin 30072, China. jkwang@tju.edu.cn.
⁶ Collaborative Innovation Center of Chemical Science and Engineering, Tianjin 30072, China. jkwang@tju.edu.cn.
⁷ School of Chemical Engineering and Technology, Tianjin University, Tianjin 30072, China. hl509@cam.ac.uk.
⁸ State Key Laboratory of Chemical Engineering, Tianjin University, Tianjin 30072, China. hl509@cam.ac.uk.
⁹ Collaborative Innovation Center of Chemical Science and Engineering, Tianjin 30072, China. hl509@cam.ac.uk.
¹⁰ School of Chemical Engineering and Technology, Tianjin University, Tianjin 30072, China. x_huang@tju.edu.cn.
¹¹ State Key Laboratory of Chemical Engineering, Tianjin University, Tianjin 30072, China. x_huang@tju.edu.cn.
¹² Collaborative Innovation Center of Chemical Science and Engineering, Tianjin 30072, China. x_huang@tju.edu.cn.
¹³ School of Chemical Engineering and Technology, Tianjin University, Tianjin 30072, China. coolpeanut@163.com.
¹⁴ State Key Laboratory of Chemical Engineering, Tianjin University, Tianjin 30072, China. coolpeanut@163.com.
¹⁵ Collaborative Innovation Center of Chemical Science and Engineering, Tianjin 30072, China. coolpeanut@163.com.
¹⁶ School of Chemical Engineering and Technology, Tianjin University, Tianjin 30072, China. hongxunhao@tju.edu.cn.
¹⁷ State Key Laboratory of Chemical Engineering, Tianjin University, Tianjin 30072, China. hongxunhao@tju.edu.cn.
¹⁸ Collaborative Innovation Center of Chemical Science and Engineering, Tianjin 30072, China. hongxunhao@tju.edu.cn.

Abstract

Recyclable nanomaterials are in great need to develop clean technology for applications in the removal of water contaminants. In this work, easily separable montmorillonite/Fe₃O₄/humic acid (MFH) nanocomposites were fabricated through a facile hydrothermal route. It was found the adsorption ability and stability of MFH was significantly enhanced due to the synergistic effects between montmorillonite, Fe₃O₄ nanoparticles and humic acid. The MFH nanocomposites are highly efficient and recyclable as they can remove at least 82.3% of Cr(VI) and 95.1% of aniline in six consecutive runs. The adsorption mechanism was investigated by analyzing the kinetic parameters of pseudo first-order, pseudo second-order, and intraparticle diffusion models and describing the equilibrium isotherms of Langmuir and Freundlich models. Results indicated different adsorption mechanisms of Cr(VI) and aniline by MFH. The readily synthesized MFH nanocomposites can act as effective and practical materials for environmental applications.

Keywords: adsorption; isotherms; kinetics; nanocomposites; reusability; wastewater.