Heterogeneous activation of Oxone by Co(x)Fe(3-x)O4 nanocatalysts for degradation of rhodamine B.

The removal of Rhodamine B (RhB) by Co(x)Fe(3-x)O(4) magnetic nanoparticles activated Oxone has been performed in this study. A series of Co(x)Fe(3-x)O(4) nanoparticles was synthesized using a hydrothermal method. The synthetic Co(x)Fe(3-x)O(4) nanoparticles were characterized using X-ray diffraction (XRD) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). The results showed that they were spinel structures and Co was introduced into their structures. The performances of Co(x)Fe(3-x)O(4) nanocatalysts on the activation of Oxone for removal of RhB were investigated and we found that the higher cobalt content in the catalyst, the better removal performance was resulted. A series experiments of reaction conditions were also performed, which confirmed that weak acidic, higher temperature, higher dosages of Co(x)Fe(3-x)O(4) nanocatalyst and Oxone and lower concentration of RhB were favored for the degradation of RhB. The pseudo-first order kinetics was observed to fit the Co(x)Fe(3-x)O(4)/Oxone process. Furthermore, the reaction mechanism was discussed and the scavenging effect was examined by using phenol and tert-butyl alcohol which indicated that sulfate radicals were the dominating reactive species responsible for the degradation process. Finally, the stability of Co(x)Fe(3-x)O(4) nanocatalyst was studied.

Determination of trace triclosan in environmental water by microporous bamboo-activated charcoal solid-phase extraction combined with HPLC-ESI-MS.

A sensitive and efficient analytical method for triclosan (TCS) determination in water, which involves enrichment with bamboo-activated charcoal and detection with HPLC-ESI-MS, was developed. The influence of several operational parameters, including the eluant and its volume, the flow rate, the volume andacidity of the sample, and the amount of bamboo-activated charcoal, were investigated and optimized. Under the optimum conditions, linearity of the method was observed in the range of 0.02-20 µg/L, with correlation coefficients (r(2) ) >0.9990. The limit of detection was 0.002 µg/L based on the ratio of chromatographic signal to baseline noise (S/N = 3). The spiked recoveries of TCS in real water samples were achieved in the range of 97.6-112.5%. The proposed method was applied to analyze TCS in real aqueous samples. All the surface water samples collected in Xiaoqing River had detectable levels of TCS with concentrations of 42-197 ng/L.

Degradation of amoxicillin in aqueous solution using sulphate radicals under ultrasound irradiation.

Degradation of the antibiotics amoxicillin in aqueous solution using sulphate radicals under ultrasound irradiation was investigated. The preliminary studies of optimal degradation methodology were conducted with only oxone (2KHSO(5) · KHSO(4) · K(2)SO(4)), cobalt activated oxone (oxone/Co(2+)), oxone+ultrasonication (oxone/US) and cobalt activated oxone+ultrasonication (oxone/Co(2+)/US). The chemical oxygen demand (COD) removal efficiency were in the order of oxone