Absorption of Silver Ions by Wool

Abstract

The absorption of silver ion by wool was measured as a function of pH, time, and silver concentration. A small fraction of the silver was found to react irreversibly with cystine and a possible reaction mechanism was deduced by comparing the uptake of untreated and modified wool samples. The major interaction is the reversible formation of silver complexes in competition with hydrogen ions. A Donnan membrane formulation and graphical analysis of this interaction permitted the calculation of dissociation contents and the number of exchanging sites. The sites of complex formation were identified as free carboxyl functions.