Content area
Abstract
Four soils, phaeozem (PM), saline-alkali soil (SA), meadow albic bleached soil (MA) and dark brown forest soil (DB) from Northeast China were used to examine the sorption and desorption characteristics of Cd and pH influence on it. According to sorption experiment without pH control, the order of amount of absorbed Cd by soils was: SA>PM>DB>MA. The results from non-linear fitting method showed that Langmuir and Freundrich models were more adaptable than Temkin model in describing the sorption data. The maximum sorption amounts from Langmuir model were: PM>SA>MA>DB. Exponential equation for PM and SA and quadratic equation for MA and DB were suitable to fit the desorption data. The order of average desorption percentage was: MA>DB>PM>SA. The amounts of sorption by PM, DB and MA reached the maximum in pH 9.0, while sorption by SA was linearly increased in the experimental range of pH 3.3-11.4. In uniform pH, however, Cd sorption by SA was the minimum among four soils, which indicated that the more amounts of Cd absorbed by SA in isotherm sorption were ascribed to the higher soil pH. The higher sorption of Cd in PM resulted from the higher percentage of organic matter and clay components.[PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]