Anchoring ZIF-67 particles on amidoximerized polyacrylonitrile fibers for radionuclide sequestration in wastewater and seawater

Wenting Li; Yang-Yi Liu; Yang Bai; Jun Wang; Huan Pang

doi:10.1016/j.jhazmat.2020.122692

Anchoring ZIF-67 particles on amidoximerized polyacrylonitrile fibers for radionuclide sequestration in wastewater and seawater

J Hazard Mater. 2020 Aug 5:395:122692. doi: 10.1016/j.jhazmat.2020.122692. Epub 2020 Apr 14.

Authors

Wenting Li¹, Yang-Yi Liu², Yang Bai², Jun Wang³, Huan Pang⁴

Affiliations

¹ School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Yangzhou University, Yangzhou, 225009 Jiangsu, China; Key Laboratory of Superlight Material and Surface Technology, Ministry of Education, Harbin Engineering University, Harbin, 150001 Harbin, China.
² School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Yangzhou University, Yangzhou, 225009 Jiangsu, China.
³ Key Laboratory of Superlight Material and Surface Technology, Ministry of Education, Harbin Engineering University, Harbin, 150001 Harbin, China.
⁴ School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Yangzhou University, Yangzhou, 225009 Jiangsu, China. Electronic address: panghuan@yzu.edu.cn.

PMID: 32330785
DOI: 10.1016/j.jhazmat.2020.122692

Abstract

Capturing uranium (U(VI)) ions from wastewater and seawater is highly attractive for the environment and clean energy with the increasing deficiency of land sources. Howbeit, the massive volume of water and the ultralow concentration of U(VI) pose a substantial challenge to the industrial application. Accordingly, we have synthesized a novel organic-inorganic hybrid adsorbent through in-situ growing MOF particles on electrospun polyacrylonitrile fibers (PAN) followed by modifing with amidoxime groups to form amidoximed PAN/ZIF-67 (AOPAN/ZIF) hybrid fibers. In such fibers, the N atoms from imidazole and amidoxime can improve the adsorption performance synergistically in a wide pH range, which is favorable for capturing U(VI) under nuclear wastewater and seawater. As a result, the AOPAN/ZIF fibers exhibit high adsorption amount of 498.4 mg g^-1 in U(VI) contaminated aqueous solution at pH 4. Furthermore, the adsorption amount of U(VI) reached 2.03 mg g^-1 in natural seawater after 36 d, which implies that the AOPAN/ZIF fibers may promote the development of U(VI) recovery.

Keywords: Amidoxime functionalization; Electrospinning; Polyacrylonitrile; Uranium extraction; ZIF-67.