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Abstract
The present work investigated the impact of TEOS doping over morphology, structure, and adsorptive behavior of silica aerogels. Sodium silicate solution extracted from rice husk ash was used as a precursor to synthesize two silica aerogels. One of the aerogels was doped with TEOS while the other was processed without doping. The silica aerogels were characterized via SEM, FTI, XRD, and BET. It was shown that TEOS-doped aerogel has improved morphology, structure, and properties with surface area, pore size, pore volume, and porosity of 264 m2/g, 8.7 nm, 0.56 cm3/g, and 74.9% whereas non-TEOS aerogel with 220 m2/g, 8.3 nm, 0.48 cm3/g, and 69.8% respectively. Both the aerogels were highly mesoporous. Moreover, the aerogels were investigated for Pb removal from synthetic wastewater. It was shown that TEOS-doped aerogel performed better with higher Pb removal % than non-TEOS. Finally, the isotherms (Langmuir and Freundlich) for both the adsorption systems were studied. It was shown that Langmuir isotherms best fit the adsorption by both the aerogels.
Details
; Jamali, Abdul Rauf 2 ; Khan, Waseem 3 1 Quaid-e-Awam University of Engineering, Department of Chemical Engineering, Nawabshah, Pakistan (GRID:grid.444974.e) (ISNI:0000 0004 0609 1767)
2 NED University of Engineering and Technology, Materials Engineering Department, Karachi, Pakistan (GRID:grid.440548.9) (ISNI:0000 0001 0745 4169)
3 NED University of Engineering and Technology, Department of Metallurgical Engineering, Karachi, Pakistan (GRID:grid.440548.9) (ISNI:0000 0001 0745 4169)