Dual-functional sites for synergistic adsorption of Cr(VI) and Sb(V) by polyaniline-TiO₂ hydrate: Adsorption behaviors, sites and mechanisms

Highlights

• PANI/Ti(OH)_n^(4–n)+ exhibited excellent adsorption capacity and reusability.

• Adsorption sites of Cr(VI) were hydroxyl, amino/imino group and benzene rings.

• Sb(V) was adsorbed mainly through hydrogen bonds and Ti-O-Sb.

• The formation of Cr-O-Sb in dual system demonstrated the synergistic adsorption.

• PANI/TiO₂ was a potential widely-applied adsorbent and worth further exploring.

Abstract

Removal of chromium (Cr) and antimony (Sb) from aquatic environments is crucial due to their bioaccumulation, high mobility and strong toxicity. In this work, a composite adsorbent consisting of Ti(OH)_n^(4–n)+ and polyaniline (PANI) was designed and successfully synthesized by a simple and eco-friendly method for the uptake of Cr(VI) and Sb(V). The synthetic PANI/TiO₂ composites exhibited excellent adsorption capacities for Cr(VI) and Sb(V) (394.43 mg/g for Cr(VI) and 48.54 mg/g for Sb(V)), wide pH applicability and remarkable reusability. The adsorption of Cr(VI) oxyanions mainly involved electrostatic attraction, hydrogen bonding and anion-π interactions. Based on X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and FT-IR analysis, the adsorption sites were shown to be hydroxyl groups, amino/imino groups and benzene rings. Sb(V) was adsorbed mainly through hydrogen bonds and surface complexation to form Ti-O-Sb complexes. The formation of Cr-O-Sb in the dual system demonstrated the synergistic adsorption of Cr(VI) and Sb(V). More importantly, because of the different adsorption sites, the adsorption of Cr(VI) and Sb(V) occurred independently and was enhanced to some extent in the dual system. The results suggested that PANI/TiO₂ is a promising prospect for practical wastewater treatment in the removal of Cr(VI) and Sb(V) from wastewater owing to its availability, wide applicability and great reusability.

Graphical abstract

Keywords

Polyaniline/TiO₂ / Chromium / Antimony / Adsorption / Desorption / Mechanism

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Acknowledgements

We gratefully acknowledge the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 51978569, 22008188, and 52070155), and Key R&D projects of Shaanxi Province (China) (Nos. 2018KW-036, 2020SF-413, and 2020SF-421).

Declaration of Competing Interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Electronic Supplementary Material

Supplementary material is available in the online version of this article at htts://doi.org/10.1007/s11783-022-1526-7 and is accessible for authorized users.

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