Elimination of Chromium (VI) in Waters by the use of waste agricultural biomaterials

SILVIA GARCÍA; SEBASTIAN BELLÚ; JUAN CARLOS GONZÁLEZ; NADIA MAMANA; MARÍA JOSE CERUTI; SANDRA SIGNORELLA; LUIS FEDERICO SALA

BIOCELL

INST HISTOL EMBRIOL-CONICET

Año: 2006 p. 396 - 396

0327-9545

Cr(VI) is accepted to be a carcinogenic and mutagenic agent and its concentration may be elevated in industrial effluents. Biosorption has been accepted as an effective method to the reduction of contamination by metals in industrial effluents. Maize is one of the major farming in our country. One of the harvest by products of maize is the grain less stalk of corn. The goal of this project is to find low cost biomaterials able to retain chromium species in an insoluble matrix. The adsorption studies in batch are performed at different dose of adsorbent to obtain the equilibrium isotherm. Also it is performed a pH dependent adsorption study. On changing pH of the reaction mixture it was observed that chromium adsorption diminished on increasing pH at a given grain less stalk of corn mass. The adsorption isotherm was performed at pH=0,8 and T=20o C. Isotherm parameters were evaluated by non lineal regression applying Freundlich isotherm model. The greatest chromium quantity adsorbed by unit of grain less stalk of corn mass was 2,61±0,01 mg/g. This value is equivalent to that obtained using other biomaterials therefore grain less stalk of corn would be a good biomaterial in order to be used in remediation of chromium contaminated waters