Novel glauconite nanorods (GNRs) were synthesized by the sonication-induced chemical expansion and scrolling process of natural glauconite. The synthetic nanostructure was characterized by different analytical techniques as a superior adsorbent for the malachite green dye (MG). The synthetic GNRs were detected as porous nanorods with an average length of 150 nm to 5 μm, an average diameter of 25 to 200 nm, and a specific surface area of 123.7 m2/g. As an adsorbent for MG, the synthetic GNRs showed superior uptake capacity up to 1265.6 mg/g at the saturation stage, which is higher than most of the recently developed highly adsorbent dyes. The adsorption behavior and mechanistic properties were depicted by using modern and traditional equilibrium modeling. The kinetic assumption of the pseudo-first-order model (R2 > 0.94) and the classic isotherm of the Langmuir equilibrium model (R2 > 0.97) were used to describe the adsorption reactions. The steric investigation demonstrates that each active site on the surface of GNRs can adsorb up to three MG molecules (n = 2.19-2.48) in vertical orientation involving multimolecular mechanisms. Also, the determined active site density (577.89 mg/g) demonstrates the enrichment of the surface of GNRs with numerous adsorption receptors with strong affinity for the MG dye. The energetic study, including Gaussian energy (6.27-7.97 kJ/mol) and adsorption energy (9.45-10.43 kJ/mol), revealed that GNRs had physically adsorbed the dye, which might involve electrostatic attraction, hydrogen bonding, van der Waals forces, and dipole forces. The internal energy, enthalpy, and entropy determined the exothermic and spontaneous uptake of MG.
© 2023 The Authors. Published by American Chemical Society.