Nanotechnology for Water Environmental Application

Abstract

In developing countries like Pakistan, industries do not allocate budget for control and treatment of pollution due to limited resources. Most of the pollutants emitted from these industries are usually reusable but their capture from waste is highly uneconomical. This goal can be attained by synthesizing the advanced materials such as silica hybrids, the class of silica hybrids consisting of inorganic silica linked with organic ligands to form network structure. Their high porosity, surface area, and crystallinity provide a way for removing large amount of pollutants with small quantity of silica hybrids. These applications include the use of powder hybrids as adsorbent for removal of different pollutants such as heavy metals, persistent organic pollutants, and toxic organic chemicals. These functionalized hybrids can be further fabricated into thin films. This new form will be further used for catalytic degradation of various pollutants. Besides all these applications, these hybrids will have the potential to be used as sensors for detecting various pollutants in industries.