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Preparation of Al2O3-SiO2 composite aerogels and their Cu2+ absorption properties

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Abstract

In order to remediate heavy metal ions from waste water, Al2O3-SiO2 composite aerogels are prepared via a sol—gel and an organic solvent sublimation drying method. Various characterisation techniques have been employed including X-ray diffraction (XRD), Fourier transform infrared spectrometry (FTIR), scanning electron microscope (SEM), Energy-dispersion X-ray spectroscopy (EDX), Brunauer—Emmett—Teller (BET) N2 adsoprtion isotherm, and atomic absorption spectrometer (AAS). XRD and FTIR suggest that the aerogels are composed of mainly Al2O3 and minor SiO2. They have a high specific surface area (827.544 m2/g) and high porosity (86.0%) with a pore diameter of ∼20 nm. Their microstructures show that the distribution of Al, Si, and O is homogeneous. The aerogels can remove ∼99% Cu2+ within ∼40 min and then reach the equilibrium uptake (∼69 mg/g). Preliminary calculations show that the Cu2+ uptake by the aerogels follows pseudo second-order kinetics where chemical sorption may take effect owing largely to the high surface area, high porosity, and abundant functional groups, such as Al-OH and Si-OH, in the aerogel network. The prepared aerogels may serve as efficient absorbents for Cu2+ removal.

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Acknowledgements

This work was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 51602018), the Beijing Municipal Natural Science Foundation (No. 2154052), the China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (No. 2014M560044), and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities, China (No. FRF-GF-17-B7).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Materials Science and Engineering, University of Science and Technology Beijing, Beijing, 100083, China

    Xiao-guang Liu, Qiu-shuo Mao, Yue Jiang, Yan Li & Jia-lin Sun

  2. Fundamental Experimental Centre of Nature Science, University of Science and Technology Beijing, Beijing, 100083, China

    Fei-xue Huang

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Liu, Xg., Mao, Qs., Jiang, Y. et al. Preparation of Al2O3-SiO2 composite aerogels and their Cu2+ absorption properties. Int J Miner Metall Mater 28, 317–324 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12613-020-2111-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12613-020-2111-3

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