Pharmaceutical active compounds, including hundreds of different substances, are counted among the emerging contaminants in waterbodies, whose presence raises a growing concern for the ecosystem. Drugs are metabolized and excreted mainly through urine as an unchanged active ingredient or in the form of metabolites. These emerging contaminants are not effectively removed with the technologies currently in use, making them a relevant environmental problem. This study proposes the treatment of urine and water at the source that can allow an easier removal of dissolved drugs and metabolites. The treatment of synthetic urine, with dissolved ibuprofen as a model compound, by adsorption, using various classes of inorganic materials, such as clays, hierarchical zeolites and ordered mesoporous silica (MCM-41), is presented. A multi-technique approach involving X-ray powder diffraction, solid-state NMR, UV-Vis and Raman spectroscopies was employed to investigate the adsorption process in inorganic adsorbents. Moreover, the uptake, the ensuing competition, the efficiency and selectivity as well as the packing of the model compound in ordered mesoporous silica during the incipient wetness impregnation process were all thoroughly monitored by a novel approach, involving combined complementary time-resolved in situ 1H and 13C MAS NMR spectroscopy as well as X-ray powder diffraction.
Keywords: Raman spectroscopy; X-ray powder diffraction; adsorption; ibuprofen; inorganic adsorbents; pharmaceutical active compounds; solid-state NMR; time-resolved in situ studies; water remediation.