Syed Hadi Hasan
Indian Institute of Technology(BHU), India
Title: Removal of fluoride from water using composite of GO: Optimization of process variables through RSM
Biography
Biography: Syed Hadi Hasan
Abstract
Although, the presence of fluoride in the drinking water under a certain limit (<1 mg/L) is beneficial for normal human health, fluoride concentration above 1 mg/L in drinking water can cause deleterious effects leading to dental and skeletal fluorosis, brittle bones, osteoporosis and arthritis. Therefore the removal of excess fluoride from drinking water is a matter of scientific concern. In connection to this, the potential use of rGO/ZrO2 nanocomposite for the removal of fluoride from water was investigated. The rGO/ZrO2 nanocomposite was prepared by hydrothermal method and characterized by various instrumental techniques such as FT-IR, XRD, SEM, EDX, TGA, XPS, Raman spectroscopy and BET surface area measurement. Then rGO/ZrO2 was used as an adsorbent for the removal of fluoride from water. The process variables viz. rGO/ZrO2 dose, initial fluoride concentration, temperature and pH were optimized using response surface methodology (RSM) in which the multiple regression analysis was conducted with the help of central composite design. The regression analysis showed good agreement with the experimental data having R2=0.94. Maximum percentage removal of fluoride was found to be 97% at predicted optimum values of process variables viz, rGO/ZrO2 dose 0.63 g/L, initial fluoride concentration 37.6 mg/L, temperature 33°C and pH 5.8. The Langmuir isotherm was found suitable which predicted the uptake capacity to be 59.62 mg/g. The experimental data followed the pseudo-second-order kinetic model and the process was found thermodynamically spontaneous and endothermic in nature.