Abstract
Volatile organic compounds (VOCs), which are usually organic compounds with boiling point in the range of 50 to 260°C, pose a serious threat to human health and ecological environment. In order to find an adsorbent with excellent adsorption effect on VOCs, activated carbon was prepared from corn bran partially degraded by Trichoderma viride, and the adsorption performance of the optimized porous carbon materials on toluene was studied. Physical and chemical properties (such as specific surface area, pore size distribution, and surface functional groups) of the activated carbon were characterized by scanning electron microscope (SEM), N2 adsorption/desorption experiences, Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR), and Raman and X-ray diffraction (XRD). The results showed that the specific surface area of corn bran reached 1896 m2/g and the total pore volume was 1.04 cm3/g after 15 days of microbial pretreatment. Dynamic simulation of adsorption experiment found that the saturated adsorption capacity of the pretreated carbon material was 237 mg/g at 100 ppm toluene concentration, which was 1.58 times of that of corn bran without microbial pretreatment. Generally, the improvement of adsorption performance may be mainly attributed to the increase of specific surface area, pore volume and the decrease of surface acidic groups.
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The design of the study and collection, analysis, and interpretation of data and in writing the manuscript are supported by The Science and Technology Program of Guangzhou, China, National Natural Science Foundation of China, and Natural Science Foundation of Guangdong Province, China. This study was supported by the Science and Technology Program of Guangzhou, China (grant number 202002020020 and 201804020026), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant number 51808227), and the Natural Science Foundation of Guangdong Province, China (grant numbers 2018A030313836 and 2015B020236002).
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X.W., and H.H. conceived this study. X.W., H.C., G.Y., F.Y., Y.W., Y.J., W.Z., B.L., and D.Y. performed the materials preparation, measurements and analysis, with assistance from H.H. All authors contributed to the development of ideas and writing of the manuscript.
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Wang, X., Cheng, H., Ye, G. et al. Preparation of porous carbon based on partially degraded raw biomass by Trichoderma viride to optimize its toluene adsorption performance. Environ Sci Pollut Res 28, 46186–46195 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-12796-y
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-12796-y