MXene/AgNW composite material for selective and efficient removal of radioactive cesium and iodine from water

Sajid Mushtaq; Syed M Husnain; Syed Asad Raza Kazmi; Yawar Abbas; Jongho Jeon; Jung Young Kim; Faisal Shahzad

doi:10.1038/s41598-023-47075-y

MXene/AgNW composite material for selective and efficient removal of radioactive cesium and iodine from water

Sci Rep. 2023 Nov 11;13(1):19696. doi: 10.1038/s41598-023-47075-y.

Authors

Sajid Mushtaq^{1

2}, Syed M Husnain³, Syed Asad Raza Kazmi⁴, Yawar Abbas⁵, Jongho Jeon⁶, Jung Young Kim⁷, Faisal Shahzad^{8

9}

Affiliations

¹ Division of RI-Applied Research, Korea Institute of Radiological and Medical Sciences (KIRAMS), Seoul, 01812, Korea. sajidmushtaq@pieas.edu.pk.
² Department of Nuclear Engineering, Pakistan Institute of Engineering and Applied Sciences, P. O. Nilore, Islamabad, 45650, Pakistan. sajidmushtaq@pieas.edu.pk.
³ Chemistry Division, Directorate of Science, Pakistan Institute of Nuclear Science and Technology (PINSTECH), Islamabad, 45650, Pakistan.
⁴ Department of Metallurgy and Materials Engineering, Pakistan Institute of Engineering and Applied Sciences, P.O. Nilore, Islamabad, 45650, Pakistan.
⁵ Department of Physics, Khalifa University, 127788, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.
⁶ Department of Chemistry, Kyungpook National University, Daegu 80, Republic of Korea.
⁷ Division of RI-Applied Research, Korea Institute of Radiological and Medical Sciences (KIRAMS), Seoul, 01812, Korea.
⁸ Department of Metallurgy and Materials Engineering, Pakistan Institute of Engineering and Applied Sciences, P.O. Nilore, Islamabad, 45650, Pakistan. faisal@pieas.edu.pk.
⁹ Research and Innovation Center for Graphene and 2D Materials (RIC2D), Khalifa University, 127788, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. faisal@pieas.edu.pk.

Abstract

Toxic fission products, such as cesium (¹³⁷Cs) and iodine (¹²⁹I) are of great concern because of their long half-lives and high solubility in water. The simultaneous removal of Cs and I using a single adsorbent is an area of increasing interest. In this study, MXene/silver nanowire (AgNW) composite was synthesized through physical mixing and employed for simultaneous removal of iodide (I^-) and cesium (Cs⁺) ions from contaminated water. The MXene/AgNW composite demonstrated excellent adsorption capacities of 84.70 and 26.22 mg/g for I^- and Cs⁺, respectively. The experimental data supported the hypothesis of multilayer adsorption of Cs⁺ owing to the inter-lamellar structures and the presence of heterogeneous adsorption sites in MXene. The interaction between I^- and the AgNW involved chemisorption followed by monolayer adsorption. MXene/AgNW composite material exhibited promising results in the presence of competitive ions under extreme pH conditions. Thus, synthesized composite materials holds promising potential as an adsorbent for the remediation of radioactive liquid waste.

Abstract

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