Preparation and Characterization of MnO2-Alginate Composite and Its Application for Sorption of 160Tb from Aqueous Media

Abstract The sorption of 160 Tb from aqueous solutions using MnO 2 -alginate composite is the main objective of this work. MnO 2 -alginate composite was fabricated by immobilizing MnO 2 in alginate, then characterized using many analytical techniques as FT-IR, XRD, SEM, and EDX. The impact of time, pH, initial metal concentrations, ionic strength and temperature on 160 Tb sorption were explored. As well as desorption, and recycling were also investigated. The data showed that the saturation capacity had values of 168.06 and 240.17 mg/g for MnO 2 and MnO 2 -alginate composites, respectively. The sorption of 160 Tb was dependent on pH and independence of ionic strength. Isotherms were more pertinent to Langmuir isotherm model and the reaction kinetics followed the pseudo-2 nd -order model. Desorption of 160 Tb from the loaded MnO 2 -alginate was done using different eluents and the highest elution 93.39% was attained using 0.1 M HCl. The recycling results indicated that the MnO 2 -alginate composite could be reused for repeated sorption-desorption regeneration cycles up to twenty cycles with a low reduction in the uptake percentage. The excellent recycling results reveal the applicability of the MnO 2 -alginate composite used as an effective sorbent for sorption of 160 Tb from aqueous media.