TiO 2 /PLLA Electrospun Nanofibers Membranes for Efficient Removal of Methylene Blue Using Sunlight
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ORIGINAL PAPER
TiO2/PLLA Electrospun Nanofibers Membranes for Efficient Removal of Methylene Blue Using Sunlight Noor Mohammad1 · Yomen Atassi1 Accepted: 18 September 2020 © Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2020
Abstract Globally, 80% of wastewater is still discharged in the environment without being treated at all. Wastewater treatment has become a concern to preserve the ecosystem and to secure the agricultural activities, particularly in regions suffering from water scarcity. This work presents a highly effective method that uses sunlight to rid water of organic pollutants. Titanium oxide, which is known for its photocatalytic properties for the decomposition of organic pollutants, was electrospun with a biodegradable polymer of polylactic acid (PLLA). Nano-fiber membranes of PLLA containing TiO2 were morphologically and structurally characterized using scanning electron microscopy and FT-IR spectroscopy. The wettability of the membranes was investigated and their performance was studied by measuring the adsorption capacity for methylene blue in presence of sunlight. The membranes showed a 100% removal efficiency (at pollutant concentration as high as 100 ppm and adsorbent dosage of 1 mL/mg) after exposure to sunlight for 60 min at noon in august at Damascus. This underscores the effectiveness of the environmentally and economically applied method. Keywords Membrane · Electrospinning · PLLA · Organic pollutant · TiO2
Introduction The rising economic growth in the world has created a problem between economic development and environmental protection, instead of going hand in hand [1]. With the rapid growth of industry and the significant population increase, millions of tons of pollutants are dumped into seas and rivers which have naturally led to deterioration of water quality and pollution of water resources [2]. Awareness has been raised of the danger of organic pollutants and heavy metal ions that threaten the quality of water around the world [3]. However, the most adopted method in the world to dispose of wastewater is still by discharging it into the environment, which threatens the quality of surface and groundwater [4]. The decomposition of wastes into the environment releases Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s10924-020-01895-5) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * Yomen Atassi [email protected] 1
Department of Applied Physics, Higher Institute for Applied Sciences and Technology, Damascus, Syria
large quantities of life-threatening toxins and emits gases that pollute the air [4]. It is also easy for organic pollutants to penetrate into the ground and affect groundwater quality [4]. Moreover, the presence of substances commonly resulting from the residues of the pharmaceutical industry, even at low concentrations, complicates the problem. As each substance has its own mechanism of action, this makes it difficult to be detected and removed from water through
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