Synthesis and characterization of nanocrystalline silver coating of fly ash cenosphere particles by electroless process

Removal of Cadmium from Contaminated Groundwater Using a Novel Silicon/Aluminum Nanomaterial: An Experimental Study

Cadmium (Cd) is a harmful element to human health and biodiversity. The removal of Cd from groundwater is of great significance to maintain the environmental sustainability and biodiversity. In this work, a novel low-temperature roasting associated with alkali was applied to synthesize an eco-friendly adsorbent using coal fly ash. Scanning electron microscopy, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, X-ray fluorescence, and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy were applied to analyze the physical and chemical characteristics of the adsorbent. The experiments show that a significant improvement in specific surface area and activity of adsorbent was observed in this study. The functional groups of Na-O and Fe-O were verified to be beneficial in the removal of Cd²⁺. The material capacity to adsorb Cd²⁺ was considerably improved, and the maximum uptake capacity was 61.8 mg g^-1 for Cd²⁺ at 25 °C. Furthermore, pH and ionic strength play critical roles in the adsorption process. The Langmuir and pseudo-second-order models can appropriately describe the adsorption behavior, and the enhanced adsorption ability of Cd²⁺ by modified coal fly ash was attributed to ion-exchange, co-precipitation, and complexation. Higher sorption efficiency was maintained after two regeneration cycles. These results offer valuable insights to develop high-performance adsorbent for Cd²⁺ removal.

Molecular aspects of core-shell intrinsic defect induced enhanced antibacterial activity of ZnO nanocrystals

AIM

To investigate molecular aspects of the antibacterial effect of size-dependent core-shell intrinsic defects of nanocrystalline ZnO synthesized through high energy ball milling technique.

MATERIALS & METHODS

Mechanically synthesized and characterized 7, 10 and 15 h milled ZnO nanoparticles were evaluated for antibacterial activity with molecular investigation by computational molecular docking.

RESULTS

Synthesized ZnO nanoparticles displayed shrinkage of core and increase of shell with reduction in size of bulk ZnO particles from 250 to 80, 40 and 20 nm and increase in zeta potential up to -19 mV in 7, 10 and 15 h nano ZnO. Antibacterial activity was found increased with decrease in size due to increased reactive oxygen species and membrane damage in bacteria.

CONCLUSION

Synthesized nano ZnO exhibit size-dependent antibacterial action as consequences of interactions with cell membrane proteins via hydrogen bond interaction with amino acid residues followed by internalization, membrane depolarization and induction of reactive oxygen species generation.

Fabrication of a pure, uniform electroless silver film using ultrafine silver aerosol particles

To obtain evenly distributed pure Ag particles with a narrow size distribution on a polymer membrane, a novel activation procedure with an environmentally friendly, cost-effective method was utilized as a pretreatment before electroless Ag deposition. The pretreatment was first performed on an untreated membrane surface by collecting ultrafine ambient spark-generated Ag aerosol particles. After annealing, the electroless Ag film was fabricated on the collected aerosol particles in the Ag electroless bath. Experimental characterizations showed that the ultrafine Ag particles were uniformly anchored onto the membrane surface through pretreatment, resulting in a pure Ag film of closely packed particles with a narrow size distribution on the membrane, and the properties were comparable to those of an Ag film on wet Sn-Ag-activated membranes.