Anionic Dye Removal Using a Date Palm Seed-Derived Activated Carbon/Chitosan Polymer Microbead Biocomposite

Hani Hussain Sait; Ahmed Hussain; Mohamed Bassyouni; Imtiaz Ali; Ramesh Kanthasamy; Bamidele Victor Ayodele; Yasser Elhenawy

doi:10.3390/polym14122503

Anionic Dye Removal Using a Date Palm Seed-Derived Activated Carbon/Chitosan Polymer Microbead Biocomposite

Polymers (Basel). 2022 Jun 20;14(12):2503. doi: 10.3390/polym14122503.

Authors

Hani Hussain Sait¹, Ahmed Hussain¹, Mohamed Bassyouni^{2

3}, Imtiaz Ali², Ramesh Kanthasamy², Bamidele Victor Ayodele⁴, Yasser Elhenawy⁵

Affiliations

¹ Department of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering Rabigh, King Abdulaziz University, Rabigh 21911, Saudi Arabia.
² Department of Chemical and Materials Engineering, Faculty of Engineering Rabigh, King Abdulaziz University, Rabigh 21911, Saudi Arabia.
³ Department of Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Port Said University, Port Fouad 42526, Egypt.
⁴ Department of Chemical Engineering, Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS, Seri Iskandar 32610, Malaysia.
⁵ Department of Mechanical and Power Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Port Said University, Port Fouad 42526, Egypt.

Abstract

The discharge of textile wastewater into aquatic streams is considered a major challenge due to its effect on the water ecosystem. Direct blue 78 (DB78) dye has a complex structure. Therefore, it is difficult to separate it from industrial wastewater. In this study, carbon obtained from the pyrolysis of mixed palm seeds under different temperatures (400 °C and 1000 °C) was activated by a thermochemical method by using microwave radiation and an HCl solution in order to improve its adsorption characteristics. The generated activated carbon was used to synthesize a novel activated carbon/chitosan microbead (ACMB) for dye removal from textile wastewater. The obtained activated carbon (AC) was characterized by a physicochemical analysis that included, namely, particle size, zeta potential, SEM, EDX, and FTIR analyses. A series of batch experiments were conducted in terms of the ACMB dose, contact time, pH, and activated carbon/chitosan ratios in synthetic microbeads for enhancing the adsorption capacity. A remarkable improvement in the surface roughness was observed using SEM analysis. The particle surface was transformed from a slick surface with a minor-pore structure to a rough surface with major-pore structure. The zeta potential analysis indicated a higher improvement in the carbon surface charge, from -35 mv (before activation) to +20 mv (after activation). The adsorption tests showed that the dye-removal efficiency increased with the increasing adsorbent concentration. The maximum removal efficiencies were 97.8% and 98.4% using 3 and 4 g/L of AC_400°C MB-0.3:1 and AC_1000°C MB-0.3:1, respectively, with initial dye concentrations of 40 mg/L under acidic conditions (pH = 4-5), and an optimal mixing time of 50 min. The equilibrium studies for AC_400°C MB-0.3:1 and AC_1000°C MB-0.3:1 showed that the equilibrium data best fitted to the Langmuir isothermal model with R² = 0.99. These results reveal that activated carbon/chitosan microbeads are an effective adsorbent for the removal of direct blue 78 dye and provide a new platform for dye removal.

Keywords: activated carbon; adsorption; chitosan; direct dye removal; isothermal models; microbeads; microwave radiation.

Grants and funding

11-WAT2033-03/Innovation MAARIFAH-King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology