Sorption mechanism of naphthalene by diesel soot: Insight from displacement with phenanthrene/p-nitrophenol.

The nonlinear sorption of hydrophobic organic contaminants (HOCs) could be changed to linear sorption by the suppression of coexisting solutes in natural system, resulting in the enhancement of mobility, bioavailability and risks of HOCs in the environment. In previous study, inspired from the competitive adsorption on activated carbon (AC), the displaceable fraction of HOCs sorption to soot by competitor was attributed to the adsorption on elemental carbon fraction of soot (EC-Soot), while the linear and nondisplaceable fraction was attributed to the partition in authigenic organic matter of soot (OM-Soot). In this study, however, we observed that the linear and nondisplaceable fraction of HOC (naphthalene) to a diesel soot (D-Soot) by competitor (phenanthrene or p-nitrophenol) should be attributed to not only the linear partition in OM-Soot, but also the residual linear adsorption on EC-Soot. We also observed that the competition on the surface of soot dominated by external surface was different from that of AC dominated by micropore surface, i.e., complete displacement of HOCs by p-nitrophenol could occur for the micropore surface of AC, but not for the external surface of soot. These observations were obtained through the separation of EC-Soot and OM-Soot from D-Soot with organic-solvent extraction and the sorption comparisons of D-Soot with an AC (ACF300) and a multiwalled carbon nanotube (MWCNT30). The obtained results would give new insights to the sorption mechanisms of HOCs by soot and help to assess their environmental risks.