Fabrication of easy separable and reusable MIL-125(Ti)/MIL-53(Fe) binary MOF/CNT/Alginate composite microbeads for tetracycline removal from water bodies

Ahmed M Omer; Eman M Abd El-Monaem; Gehan M El-Subruiti; Mona M Abd El-Latif; Abdelazeem S Eltaweil

doi:10.1038/s41598-021-03428-z

Fabrication of easy separable and reusable MIL-125(Ti)/MIL-53(Fe) binary MOF/CNT/Alginate composite microbeads for tetracycline removal from water bodies

Sci Rep. 2021 Dec 10;11(1):23818. doi: 10.1038/s41598-021-03428-z.

Authors

Ahmed M Omer¹, Eman M Abd El-Monaem², Gehan M El-Subruiti³, Mona M Abd El-Latif⁴, Abdelazeem S Eltaweil⁵

Affiliations

¹ Polymer Materials Research Department, Advanced Technology and New Materials Research Institute (ATNMRI), City of Scientific Research and Technological Applications (SRTA-City), P. O. Box: 21934, New Borg El-Arab City, Alexandria, Egypt. amomar@srtacity.sci.eg.
² Chemistry Department, Faculty of Science, Alexandria University, Alexandria, Egypt. emanabdelmonaem5925@yahoo.com.
³ Chemistry Department, Faculty of Science, Alexandria University, Alexandria, Egypt.
⁴ Fabrication Technology Department, Advanced Technology and New Materials Research Institute (ATNMRI), City of Scientific Research and Technological Applications (SRTA-City), P. O. Box: 21934, New Borg El-Arab City, Alexandria, Egypt.
⁵ Chemistry Department, Faculty of Science, Alexandria University, Alexandria, Egypt. abdelazeemeltaweil@alexu.edu.eg.

Abstract

In this investigation, we aimed to fabricate easy separable composite microbeads for efficient adsorption of tetracycline (TC) drug. MIL-125(Ti)/MIL-53(Fe) binary metal organic framework (MOF) was synthetized and incorporated with carbon nanotube (CNT) into alginate (Alg) microbeads to form MIL-125(Ti)/MIL-53(Fe)/CNT@Alg composite microbeads. Various tools including FTIR, XRD, SEM, BET, Zeta potential and XPS were applied to characterize the composite microbeads. It was found that the specific surface area of MIL-125(Ti)/MIL-53(Fe)/CNT@Alg microbeads was 273.77 m²/g. The results revealed that the adsorption of TC augmented with rising CNT proportion up to 15 wt% in the microbeads matrix. In addition, the adsorption process followed the pseudo-second-order and well-fitted to Freundlich and Langmuir models with a maximum adsorption capacity of 294.12 mg/g at 25 ◦C and pH 6. Furthermore, thermodynamic study clarified that the TC adsorption process was endothermic, random and spontaneous. Besides, reusability test signified that MIL-125(Ti)/MIL-53(Fe)/CNT@Alg composite microbeads retained superb adsorption properties for six consecutive cycles, emphasizing its potentiality for removing of pharmaceutical residues.