Rapidly adsorption of antibiotics in water onto demolded MCM-41 mesoporous materials

Abstract

Abstract Antibiotic pollution has seriously affected human life and the ecological environment. And the development of economical and environmentally friendly adsorbent materials has become a research hotspot in this field. Mesoporous molecular sieve MCM-41 has good adsorption capacity, low cost, and strong adsorbent regeneration, with a high application value. Here, we studied the adsorption effects of demolded MCM-41 materials on tetracycline, doxycycline, and levofloxacin at different temperatures. The optimal demolding temperature was determined to be 800°C, and the adsorption experiments on three kinds of pollutants were conducted. The results showed that neutral or weak acid pH was beneficial to the adsorption. Also, alkaline pH inhibited adsorption; therefore, the Langmuir model could fit the adsorption thermodynamics well. The adsorption of MCM-41 for three kinds of pollutants conformed to the second-order adsorption kinetics model and belonged to chemical adsorption. The results demonstrated that MCM-41 has excellent potential for decontaminating of antibiotics wastewater.