A Atamaleki, N Naimi, Y Fakhri, H Sharifi Maleksari, H Nosrati, S Fallah,
Volume 12, Issue 4 (2-2020)
Abstract
Background and Objective: Nowadays, water shortage crisis leads to wastewater reuse in agriculture sector. The presence of pollutants such as heavy metal in wastewater results in the accumulation of them in vegetables, and it will finally be transferred to consumers and will have irreversible effects on their health. Therefore, the present study was performed to do a systematic review along with meta-analysis on heavy metal accumulation in mint plant that is irrigated with wastewater.
Materials and Methods: Related articles were collected from databases like SID, Magiran, Iranmedex, IranDoc, Embase, Medline, PubMed, Web of Science, Scopus, and Google scholar between 1982 and 2019 and the required data were extracted. Then, due to the heterogeneity of studies entered in the research, a random effect model was applied to analyze them using STATA 14 software. Non-carcinogenic risk was assessed for children and adults.
Results: According to the search results, 1693 articles were entered in the review process until the beginning of 2019 and finally only 12 articles were included in the research. According to the results of the meta-analysis, the order of the metals based on concentration (mg/kg) were: Zn > Ni > Cr > Cu > Pb > Cd. Also, based on the non-carcinogenic risk assessment results, mint consumption showed a significant health effects on children age group compared to adults, especially in India and Pakistan.
Conclusion: wastewater reuse in agriculture sector leads to increase concentration of metals in vegetables like mint. This increased the risk of non-carcinogenicity in the age groups, especially children. Therefore, it is recommended that continuous monitoring of irrigation sources, soils, and vegetables is done to prevent the transmission of these pollutants to the human food cycle.
Anasheh Mardiroosi, Hanieh Fakhri, Ali Esrafili, Masoumeh Hasham Firooz, Mahdi Farzadkia,
Volume 15, Issue 4 (3-2023)
Abstract
Background and Objective: Pharmaceutical compounds can cause potential risks to aquatic and terrestrial organisms. So far, different methods have been used to eliminate these pollutants, photocatalytic processes are one of the most efficient processes to eliminate pharmaceutical compounds. In this study, the efficiency of a novel MOF-based nanocomposite, PMo/UiO-66 as a photocatalyst for amoxicillin degradation under visible light irradiation was evaluated.
Materials and Methods: The study of the chemical decomposition of amoxicillin using the PMo/UiO-66 system was conducted at different stages. First, the PMo/UiO-66 MOF nanocomposite was synthesized using the solvothermal method, then the properties of the synthesized nanocomposite were investigated using XRD, FTIR, and SEM techniques. The effect of different operational parameters such as pH (3, 6, and 9), catalyst concentration (15, 20, 25, and 30 %w/w), initial concentrations of amoxicillin (20, 30, 40, and 50 mg/L) at different times on the removal efficiency was investigated. The reusability of the catalyst for four cycles was assessed.
Results: The results showed that PMo/UiO-66 nanocomposite at pH 6, 25 %w/w nanocomposite concentration, and the amoxicillin concentration of 20 mg/L led to complete decomposition of amoxicillin after 120 min. The kinetic of amoxicillin removal followed the first-order model. Reusability tests showed that the photocatalytic efficiency of the synthesized catalyst was not substantially reduced after four cycles.
Conclusion: The current study confirmed that the PMo/UiO-66 system has an appropriate efficiency for photocatalytic removal of amoxicillin under optimized test conditions.
Mojtaba Yeganeh, Sevda Fallah, Hanieh Fakhri, Mahdi Farzadkia,
Volume 17, Issue 1 (6-2024)
Abstract
Background and Objective: Phenol compounds are commonly applied as raw materials in the production of pesticides, herbicides, and dyes. These compounds are toxic to animals, plants, and microorganisms. In this study, the sonophotocatalytic degradation of 2,4-dinitrophenol in aqueous solutions was investigated using organic-mineral polymer catalysts containing Zink and Cobalt oxides under visible light and ultrasonic (US) irradiation.
Materials and Methods: The characteristics of the synthesized catalyst were determined using XRD, FTIR, and SEM techniques. The effect of several key parameters, including pH (3-9), catalyst dosage (0.3-1 g/L), time (0-90 min), US power (100-200 W/m2), and initial concentration of 2,4-dinitrophenol (20-100 mg/L), on the degradation efficiency was also investigated.
Results: After 75 minutes of sonophotocatalytic processing, complete degradation of 2,4-dinitrophenol (20mg/L) was achieved with catalyst dosage of 0.5 g/L, pH of 9.0, and US intensity of 200 W/m2. Kinetic studies indicated that the sonophotocatalytic degradation process followed a first-order kinetic model. The results of radical scavenging experiments confirmed that HO° and O2˚- radicals are the main oxidative species involved in the degradation of 2,4-dinitrophenol. Furthermore, the reuse of the catalyst for five consecutive tests showed a slight decrease in removal efficiency.
Conclusion: The results demonstrate that the sonophotocatalytic process, using the modified organic-mineral polymers with mixed Zink and Cobalt oxides catalyst, can be an effective method for removing 2,4-dinitrophenol from aqueous media.
