Use of Gold Nanoparticles as Substrate for Diffusive Monitoring of Gaseous Mercury

Paolo Papa; Ilaria Fratoddi; Iole Venditti; Francesca Vichi; Antonella Macagnano; Emiliano Zampetti; Andrea Bearzotti

doi:10.3390/ma11112119

Use of Gold Nanoparticles as Substrate for Diffusive Monitoring of Gaseous Mercury

Materials (Basel). 2018 Oct 28;11(11):2119. doi: 10.3390/ma11112119.

Authors

Paolo Papa^{1

2}, Ilaria Fratoddi³, Iole Venditti⁴, Francesca Vichi⁵, Antonella Macagnano⁶, Emiliano Zampetti⁷, Andrea Bearzotti⁸

Affiliations

¹ CNR, Institute of Atmospheric Pollution Research, V. Salaria, km 29.3, Monterotondo, 00015 Rome, Italy. paolo.papa@uniroma1.it.
² Department of Chemistry, Sapienza University of Rome, P. le Aldo Moro 5, 00185 Rome, Italy. paolo.papa@uniroma1.it.
³ Department of Chemistry, Sapienza University of Rome, P. le Aldo Moro 5, 00185 Rome, Italy. vichi@iia.cnr.it.
⁴ Department of Sciences, Roma Tre University of Rome, Via della Vasca Navale 79, 00100 Rome, Italy. a.macagnano@iia.cnr.it.
⁵ CNR, Institute of Atmospheric Pollution Research, V. Salaria, km 29.3, Monterotondo, 00015 Rome, Italy. e.zampetti@iia.cnr.it.
⁶ CNR, Institute of Atmospheric Pollution Research, V. Salaria, km 29.3, Monterotondo, 00015 Rome, Italy. a.bearzotti@iia.cnr.it.
⁷ CNR, Institute of Atmospheric Pollution Research, V. Salaria, km 29.3, Monterotondo, 00015 Rome, Italy. ilaria.fratoddi@uniroma1.it.
⁸ CNR, Institute of Atmospheric Pollution Research, V. Salaria, km 29.3, Monterotondo, 00015 Rome, Italy. iole.venditti@uniroma3.it.

Abstract

In the present work, the study and the performances of an adsorbent material for gaseous mercury employed in different diffusive bodies geometries is presented. The material is based on gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) deposited on quartz fibres filters, suitable for bonding the gaseous mercury through an amalgamation process. Following thermal desorption and analysis, the behavior of different diffusive samplers prototypes was compared. Both indoor and outdoor exposures were carried out in order to evaluate the advantages and shortcomings of the geometries in study at different sites. From the outdoor long-term exposures, a constant uptake rate (U_r), with a low influence coming from the environmental conditions, was observed for the axial geometry, reporting a high coefficient of determination (R² 0.97). Indoor exposures showed a higher reproducibility, along with a higher coefficient of determination (R² 0.99). The presented results allowed us to observe different behaviors coming from two kinds of diffusive samplers designs, showing different adsorption rates and data dispersion. This allowed us to focalize our attention on the most suitable design from these two tested prototypes, for this kind of adsorbent material.

Keywords: gaseous mercury; gold nanoparticles; pollution.