Fractal analysis of physical adsorption on material surfaces

Recent Advances in Metal-Organic Framework (MOF)-Based Composites for Organic Effluent Remediation

Environmental pollution caused by organic effluents emitted by industry has become a worldwide issue and poses a serious threat to the public and the ecosystem. Metal-organic frameworks (MOFs), comprising metal-containing clusters and organic bridging ligands, are porous and crystalline materials, possessing fascinating shape and size-dependent properties such as high surface area, abundant active sites, well-defined crystal morphologies, and huge potential for surface functionalization. To date, numerous well designated MOFs have emerged as critical functional materials to solve the growing challenges associated with water environmental issues. Here we present the recent progress of MOF-based materials and their applications in the treatment of organic effluents. Firstly, several traditional and emerging synthesis strategies for MOF composites are introduced. Then, the structural and functional regulations of MOF composites are presented and analyzed. Finally, typical applications of MOF-based materials in treating organic effluents, including chemical, pharmaceutical, textile, and agricultural wastewaters are summarized. Overall, this review is anticipated to tailor design and regulation of MOF-based functional materials for boosting the performance of organic effluent remediation.

Cycling of phosphorus from wastewater to fertilizer using wood ash after energy production

Quercus wood was used for thermal energy production, and wood bottom ash (WDBA) was used as a medium for water purification and soil fertilizer in accordance with the recently proposed food-water-energy nexus concept. The wood contained a gross calorific value of 14.83 MJ kg^-1, and the gas generated during thermal energy production has the advantage of not requiring a desulfurization unit due to its low sulfur content. Wood-fired boilers emit less CO2 and SOX than coal boilers. The WDBA had a Ca content of 66.0%, and Ca existed in the forms of CaCO3 and Ca(OH)2. WDBA absorbed P by reacting with Ca in the form of Ca5(PO4)3OH. Kinetic and isotherm models revealed that the results of the experimental work were in good agreement with the pseudo-second-order and Langmuir models, respectively. The maximum P adsorption capacity of WDBA was 76.8 mg g^-1, and 6.67 g L^-1 of WDBA dose could completely remove P in water. The toxic units of WDBA tested using Daphnia magna were 6.1, and P adsorbed WDBA (P-WDBA) showed no toxicity. P-WDBA was used as an alternative P fertilizer for rice growth. P-WDBA application resulted in significantly greater rice growth in terms of all agronomic values compared to N and K treatments without P. This study proposed the utilization of WDBA, obtained from thermal energy production, to remove P from wastewater and replenish P in the soil for rice growth.

Powder activated coke prepared from coal fast pyrolysis: fractal characteristics and SO2 adsorption

The rapid and low-cost preparation of powder activated coke (PAC) is very important for the promotion of fluidized dry desulfurization technology of activated coke. In order to explore the effect of rapid pyrolysis process on SO₂ adsorption capacity of PAC, the fractal analysis of PAC prepared under different atmospheres was carried out. The Frenkel-Halsey-Hill (FHH) method was used to determine two fractal dimensions D₁ and D₂, under relative pressures of 0-0.5 and 0.5-1, respectively. The results indicate that the fractal dimensions were influenced by the concentrations of activation agents with D₁ ranging from 2.1838 to 2.8643 and D₂ ranging from 2.7485 to 2.9257. The effect of steam on the fractal dimension of PAC sample is small, but oxygen has a great promotion effect on the fractal dimension. An n-shaped curve-based relationship between fractal dimensions and coke yields is observed with a peak values of fractal dimensions appearing around 64% yield. The SO₂ adsorption capacity shows a consecutively positive linear correlation with D₂, while it illustrates distinctly different linear rates with D₁ in intervals of 2-2.6 and 2.6-3, respectively. Taking advantage of fractal analysis as research method, this paper clarified the influence of activation atmosphere and ablative degree on the SO₂ adsorption capacity of PAC, and the research conclusion provided a basis for the PAC preparation with high SO₂ capacity.

Phosphorus adsorption onto clay minerals and iron oxide with consideration of heterogeneous particle morphology

Particle morphology plays an important role in solid-water interface adsorption, which affects the fate and behavior of phosphorus (P) in rivers and lakes and the resulting eutrophication. In this paper, three minerals including kaolinite, montmorillonite and hematite were considered to investigate the contributions of particle morphology to P adsorption using adsorption experiments and microscopic examinations. The Taylor expansion method is applied to quantitatively characterize the heterogeneity of surface morphology. The results reveal that local concave or convex micro-morphology characterized by the second order term of Taylor expansion F₂, can affect the local adsorption capacity due to its effect on the distribution of surface charge and reactive sites. Moreover, the adsorbed P at different F₂ here fits to a Weibull distribution, which can further define the representative average adsorption onto individual particles. A weighted average morphology factor F_2a is derived to characterize the surface heterogeneity, and correlated with average P adsorption of particular mineral particles. In addition, the Sips model can successfully fit the experimental data of different minerals, and the heterogeneity parameters γ and adsorption capacity Q_m in the model are proved to be functions with the basic mineral properties, including particle size, surface site density and morphology characterization as well. It is concluded that the complex surface morphology plays a significant role in particle adsorption and the morphological role need to be considered in the adsorption model in order to better describe the adsorption in system with heterogeneous solid surface.

Investigation of the problems with using gas adsorption to probe catalyst pore structure evolution during coking

A common approach to try to understand the mechanism of coking in heterogeneous catalysts is to monitor the evolution of the pore structure using gas adsorption analysis of discharged pellets. However, the standard methods of analysis of gas adsorption data, to obtain pore-size distributions, make the key assumption of thermodynamically-independent pores. This assumption neglects the possibility of co-operative adsorption phenomena, which will shown to be a critical problem when looking at coking catalysts. In this work the serial adsorption technique has been used to detect and assess the extent of co-operative effects in adsorption within coking catalysts. The reaction of decane over a hydroprocessing catalyst was used as a case study. It has been shown that the conventional analysis method would lead to a flawed picture of the pore structure changes during the coking process. For the case-study considered in this work, it was found that co-operative adsorption effects meant that 26% of the measured adsorption was occurring in pores up to three times larger than the size conventional analysis would presume. The serial adsorption technique was thus shown to provide important additional information on pore structure evolution during coking. A study of the kinetics of adsorption has been used to infer information about the general spatial location of the coking process within a pellet.

NMR studies of cooperative effects in adsorption

The conversion of gas adsorption isotherms into pore size distributions generally relies upon the assumption of thermodynamically independent pores. Hence, pore-pore cooperative adsorption effects, which might result in a significantly skewed pore size distribution, are neglected. In this work, cooperative adsorption effects in water adsorption on a real, amorphous, mesoporous silica material have been studied using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and pulsed-gradient stimulated-echo (PGSE) NMR techniques. Evidence for advanced adsorption can be seen directly using relaxation time weighted MRI. The number and spatial distributions of pixels containing pores of different sizes filled with condensate have been analyzed. The spatial distribution of filled pores has been found to be highly nonrandom. Pixels containing the largest pores present in the material have been observed to fill in conjunction with pixels containing much smaller pores. PGSE NMR has confirmed the spatially extensive nature of the adsorbed ganglia. Thus, long-range (≥40 μm) cooperative adsorption effects, between larger pores associated with smaller pores, occur within mesoporous materials. The NMR findings have also suggested particular types of pore filling mechanisms occur within the porous solid studied.

MF-DFT and experimental investigations of the origins of hysteresis in mercury porosimetry of silica materials

In order to be able to make a proper interpretation of mercury porosimetry data, to obtain a structural characterization of a porous solid, a full understanding of the causes of hysteresis in mercury porosimetry is required. Several different theories have previously been proposed, but it is still difficult to make a priori predictions of the level of hysteresis anticipated. In this work, the effect of the degree of smaller scale surface roughness on the hysteresis width has been studied using mean-field density functional simulations and the results obtained confirmed by experiments on silica materials. It has been found that the hysteresis width decreases with increased degree of surface roughness, as characterized experimentally by the surface fractal dimension.

Pore surface fractal analysis of PEG and La(III)-doped mesoporous alumina obtained by the sol-gel method

Active porous alumina was prepared via a sol-gel method and subjected to thermal treatment in the temperature range 500-1200 ?C. The addition of lanthanum effectively inhibited the surface area loss of the aluminas. Fractal analysis from nitrogen adsorption isotherm was used to study the pore surface roughness of alumina samples with different chemical compositions (PEG, PEG and lanthanum) and calcinations conditions in terms of the surface fractal dimension, d. The Mahnke and M?gel (MM) model was used to determine the value of d of La(III)-doped alumina. Following the MM model, the d value of the activated aluminas increased as the calcination temperature increased from 500 to 700 ?C but decreased after calcination at 1000, 1100 and 1200 ?C. The addition of polyethylene glycol (PEG 5600) to the boehmite sol reduced the surface fractal of the activated alumina due to the heterogeneous distribution of the pores. With increasing La(III) concentration from 0.015 to 0.045 mol La(III)/mol Al(III), the d value of La-modified alumina samples decreased, indicating a smoother surface. The obtained PEG+La-doped boehmite sol can be used as a precursor dispersion for the deposition of mesoporous alumina coatings on stainless steel foil, by the spray pyrrolysis method.

An experimental study of gas adsorption on fractal surfaces

The validity of the fractal versions of the FHH and BET theories for describing the adsorption of butane and nitrogen on a variety of partially dehydroxylated silica surfaces has been tested. The fractal dimensions obtained from adsorption data have been compared with those obtained completely independently using SAXS. It was found that the fractal dimensions obtained from butane adsorption isotherms, using both the fractal FHH and fractal BET theories, agreed well with the corresponding values obtained from SAXS over overlapping length scales. However, in general, a systematic deviation between the fractal dimension obtained from nitrogen adsorption and that obtained from SAXS was observed. The fractal dimensions obtained from nitrogen adsorption were consistently larger than those obtained from SAXS, which is the opposite of what has often been found in the literature. It has been suggested that the differences in the suitability of the adsorption theories tested to describe butane and nitrogen adsorption is due to the significant difference between the interaction strengths of these two different molecules with silica surfaces. A modified theory that can account for the discrepancy between the fractal dimensions obtained from nitrogen adsorption and SAXS has been proposed. The implications of the new theory for the accuracy of nitrogen adsorption BET surface areas for silicas are discussed.