Dye removal with nano sepiolite containing hydrogel

The removal of dyes from textile industrial wastewater is a very important issue.The adsorption of these pollutants through nontoxic, easy-to-make, and environmentally friendly adsorbents has become a popular topic lately.In addition, hydrogels have gained attention in the field of waste water treatment nowadays.In this study, the removal of cationic dyestuff, which name is Bezacryl Blue FBS, from the aqueous solution by adsorption using the newly synthesized acrylamide hydrogels containing nano sized sepiolite was investigated.Firstly, in order to obtain the sepiolite in nano size, stepwise grinding processes were carried out with zirconium oxide balls in a high-energy ball mill.The particle size was monitored with the Fe-SEM device at the end of the gradual grinding processes of the sepiolite.Acrylamide as monomer, ammonium persulfate as reaction initiator, N,N,N',N'-tetramethylethylene diamine as reaction accelerator, crosslinker 1-4 butadiol dimethacrylate hydrogel was synthesized and sepiolite obtained in appropriate nano size was used as filling material.Some parameters as the initial pH value of solution, hydrogel dosage, contact time on the adsorption process were studied.The nature of the dye-hydrogel interactions and the mechanism of the adsorption process were investigated via UV-Vis absorption spectroscopy.It was determined that the amount of the adsorbed dyestuff increased with increasing of hydrogel dosage.The maximum adsorption was observed at pH 3. Additionally, this study showed that nano sized sepiolite doped acrylamide hydrogel particles could be used as an alternative, environmentally friendly, low-cost adsorbents for color removal from industrial wastewater containing cationic dyestuff like those in the textile industry