Department of Chemical Engineering, Universitas Pertamina, Jakarta, 12220, Indonesia.
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS, Seri Iskandar, 32610, Malaysia.
F1000Res. 2022 Mar 11;11:305. doi: 10.12688/f1000research.75979.1. eCollection 2022.
High corn production and consumption in Indonesia have led to massive corn husk waste. To increase the economic value of corn husk waste, innovations have utilized its silica content as an alternative source for the synthesis of multifunctional silica compounds. In this research, silica xerogel was successfully synthesized from corn husk via the sol-gel method. Its physical properties and capabilities as an adsorbent to remove cationic dyes such as crystal violet and methylene blue in wastewater were investigated for the first time. The as-synthesized silica xerogel possesses an amorphous crystal structure with an average pore diameter of 6.35 nm, a Brunauer, Emmett, and Teller (BET) surface area of 363.72 m /g, and particle size ranging from 80 to 250 μm. The optimum contact times of silica xerogel are 90 minutes for crystal violet and 120 minutes for methylene blue adsorptions. While at the same time, the dye removal efficiencies are as high as 98.539% and 96.184%, respectively. The adsorption of both crystal violet and methylene blue on silica xerogel follows the Langmuir isotherm model and exhibits a high monolayer capacity of 69.44 mg/g and 59.17 mg/g, respectively. These findings suggest the great potential of silica xerogel synthesized from corn husk as a low-cost and effective cationic dye adsorbent.
印度尼西亚玉米产量和消费量高，导致大量玉米皮废弃物。为了提高玉米皮废弃物的经济价值，创新者利用其硅含量作为合成多功能硅化合物的替代来源。本研究首次成功地从玉米皮中通过溶胶-凝胶法合成了硅气凝胶。首次研究了其物理性质及其作为吸附剂去除废水中阳离子染料（如结晶紫和亚甲基蓝）的能力。合成的硅气凝胶具有无定形晶体结构，平均孔径为 6.35nm，BET 比表面积为 363.72m 2 /g，粒径范围为 80-250μm。硅气凝胶的最佳接触时间分别为 90 分钟用于结晶紫和 120 分钟用于亚甲基蓝吸附。同时，染料去除效率分别高达 98.539%和 96.184%。结晶紫和亚甲基蓝在硅气凝胶上的吸附均遵循朗缪尔等温吸附模型，并表现出 69.44mg/g 和 59.17mg/g 的高单层容量。这些发现表明，由玉米皮合成的硅气凝胶作为一种低成本、有效的阳离子染料吸附剂具有很大的潜力。
