Iranian Journal of

Background and Objective: Extreme use of antibiotics and discharging them to the environment lead to serious consequences. Activated carbon is the most commonly adsorbent for these contaminants but its main drawback is difficulty of its separation. The objective of this study was synthesis of magnetic activated carbon by Fe₃O₄ and investigating its efficiency in adsorption of amoxicillin from synthetic wastewater. Materials and Methods: Materials and Methods: Physical and structural characteristics of the adsorbent synthesized were analyzed using SEM, TEM, XRD and BET techniques. The effect of factors like pH, initial concentration of amoxicillin and adsorbent, contact time, and temperature were investigated to determine thermodynamic parameters, equilibrium isotherms, and kinetics of adsorption process. Results: Physical characteristics of the magnetized activated carbon showed that Fe₃O₄ nanoparticles had the average size of 30-80 nm and BET surface area was 571 m²/g. The optimum conditions of adsorption were: pH=5, contact time=90min, adsorbent dose of 1g/L and temperature 200C. The equilibrium isotherms data showed that the adsorption process fitted both Freundlich and Longmuir models with the maximum capacity of 136.98 mg/g. The kinetic of the adsorption process followed pseudo second-order model. The negative values of &DeltaH0 and &DeltaG0 obtained from studying the adsorption thermodynamic suggested that amoxicillin adsorption on magnetic activated carbon was exothermic and spontaneous. Conclusion: The present study showed that the magnetic activated carbon has high potential for adsorption of amoxicillin, in addition to features like simple and rapid separation. Therefore, it can be used for adsorption and separation of such pollutants from aqueous solutions.

Background and Objectives: Phenol is one of priority pollutants produced through leather, paint, resin, and pharmaceutical industries and it can contaminate groundwater after entering to the environment. Hence, it is necessary to use a suitable method for its removal. The aim of this study was synthesize and efficiency evaluation of magnetic nanocomposite of activated carbon powder-zero valent iron/silver (PAC-Fe^o/Ag) in the removal of phenol from aqueous solution. Material & Methods: Reduction method was used for converting bivalent iron to zero valent iron and co-precipitation method for depositing of iron on activated carbon. For coating silver on nano zero valent iron, rapid mixing at high temperature was used. The adsorbent was characterized using SEM, TEM, and XRD techniques. Then, the impact of pH, contact time, agitation speed, temperature, adsorbent, and initial phenol concentration were evaluated and optimized by one factor at the time method. Reaction kinetics and isotherms were also determined. Results: It was found that PAC-Fe^o/Ag has cubic and intertwined structure and has a diameter in the range from 40 to 100 nm. The optimum conditions for phenol removal by PAC-Fe^o/Ag were as pH=3, 90 min contact time, 200 rpm agitating speed and adsorbent concentration equal to 1 g/l. Isotherm and kinetic equations showed that the experimental data of phenol adsorption onto PAC-Fe^o/Ag are correlated to the Langmuir (R²>0.969) and pseudo-second order (R²<0.965) models, respectively. Conclusion: Under optimum conditions, modified adsorbent by zero valent iron and silver with maximum efficiency of 97% has quickly and effectively ability in removal of phenol and it can be easily separated from the solution sample by magnet because of its magnetic properties.