Chemical and Pathogenic Cleanup of Wastewater Using Surface-Functionalized CeO₂ Nanoparticles

Abstract

In this paper, we report the simple synthesis, detailed characterization, and total wastewater cleanup by adsorption using bare and surfactant-functionalized cerium oxide (CeO 2 ) nanoparticles. The synthesis of CeO 2 nanoparticles was performed by a facile aqueous solution process and characterized by a diverse range of techniques, which confirmed that the nanoparticles are well-crystalline, possessing good structural and optical properties. The competence of the prepared nanoparticles was further explored to determine the dye removal efficiency. The developed nanoparticles have also provided chlorine-free disinfection of water. The observed results revealed that the synthesized nanoparticles efficiently lower the pollutant concentrations, reduced turbidity, and exhibited significant reductions in total dissolved solids, chemical and biochemical oxygen demands, and pathogenic load. Interestingly, the surfactant-functionalized nanoparticles revealed that they possess the ability to remove approximately 99% of dye (at a specific set of conditions) from a wastewater system. Further, the dye removal efficiencies of functionalized nanoparticles varied from 112.4 to 171.3 mg/g of dye, which is superior as compared to those of other nanoadsorbents studied for the same dye. The excellent dye adsorption performance was mainly due to the higher available surface area of the functionalized CeO 2 nanoparticles. The regeneration of both dyes as well as nanoparticles further strengthens the importance of functionalized nanoparticles to utilize them for the next dye removal cycle. The in vitro antimicrobial and antimold activities of functionalized nanoparticles further revealed their disinfective nature, which is a crucial step in wastewater treatment. The presented work demonstrates that simply synthesized surface-functionalized CeO 2 nanoparticles can be used efficiently for other potential environmental remediation applications.

Efficient Removal of Azo-Dyes in Aqueous Solution by CeB6Nanocrystals

“…34−36 In addition, surface functionalization and modification were adopted to enhance the activities of oxides. 37,38 Although CeO 2 -based materials have gained increasing attention as alternative photocatalysts to the more conventional TiO 2 -based materials, there is limited information regarding the application of other types of cerium-based materials for the removal of dye contaminants from wastewater.…”

Methylene blue photodegradation using as‐synthesized CeO2 nanoparticles

“…As can be seen in Figure 1, a sharp and strong peak appears in the 509 and 560 cm À1 in the CeO 2 nanoparticles prepared at 500 and 600 C, respectively, which indicates the bond vibration of Ce-O. [4,7,53,55,57,59] Also, the two broad and weak peaks in the 1,620 and 3,485 cm À1 are related to the vibrations of water molecules absorbed by the CeO 2 nanoparticles. [3,7] The peak of impurities is not seen in these spectra.…”

“…[7][8][9]11,12,19] Cerium oxide nanoparticles [39,44] used as supercapacitor, [48] solar cell, [49] cytotoxic activity, [50] photodynamic therapy, [51] biomedical application, [52] also as photocatalytic degradation of organic pollutants [1][2][3][4][5][6] and different organic dyes. [7][8][9][53][54][55][56][57][58][59][60][61][62] The main purpose of this paper is to prepare cerium oxide (CeO 2 ) nanoparticles via solution combustion technique and use them for photocatalytic degradation and removal of methylene blue dye.…”

In Vitro Bioadsorption of Cd2+ Ions: Adsorption Isotherms, Mechanism, and an Insight to Mycoremediation

“…Interestingly, after the inoculum size 2.5% for T. fasciculatum and 2.0% for T. longibrachiatum, the uptake and percentage removal of the Cd 2+ ions were decreased significantly. It has been reported that the percentage removal of heavy metal ions increases with enhancing the adsorbent dose due to the fact that it increases the adsorption sites, which leads to high adsorption and high removal efficiency [42][43][44].…”