Carboxymethyl cellulose grafted and copper nanoparticles filled copolymer nanocomposite for fixed bed adsorption and photocatalytic degradation of antibiotic waste from water.

Methyl methacrylate (MMA) and methacrylic acid (MA) at different MMA: MA molar ratios were synthesized and crosslinked with N, N'-methylenebisacrylamide (MBA) by emulsion polymerization in the presence of carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC). Copper nanoparticles (Cu-NPs) were synthesized by the reduction of CuSO with ascorbic acid in situ in the growing polymer network. The CMC- grafted, Cu-NPs- filled, and MBA-crosslinked nanocomposites were characterized and the MMA: MA molar ratios, wt% of MBA crosslinker, and wt% of CMC, were optimized for batch adsorption of 50 mg/L of tetracycline from water using the Box-Behnken design (BBD) of response surface methodology (RSM). The nanocomposite prepared with an MMA: MA molar ratio of 5:1, 1 wt% MBA, and 1 wt% CMC (noted as C5G1Cu) exhibited a batch adsorption capacity, q, of 242.46 mg/g and a removal percentage of 97 %. The same nanocomposite showed a q of 24.2 mg/g and a removal percentage of 32 % for the column adsorption of 100 mg/L tetracycline at a flow rate of 20 mL/min and a bed height of 25 mm. The nanocomposite also exhibited a photochemical degradation of 87 % of tetracycline in visible light with a pseudo first-order rate constant of 0.02 min.