One pot eco-friendly synthesis of highly dispersed alumina supported alginate biocomposite for efficient chromium(VI) removal

An eco-friendly biocomposite namely alumina/alginate (AlAlg) composite was synthesized by uniformly dispersing alumina (Al) over alginate (Alg) polymeric matrix by one-pot method. The structure, surface morphology and elements present in the biocomposite was characterized using instrumental techniques like FTIR, SEM and EDAX analysis respectively. Batch process was adopted to investigate the potential of the composite toward chromium(VI) removal. The various adsorption influencing factors like contact time, pH, competing anions, initial chromium concentration and temperature were investigated. The maximum Cr(VI) sorption capacity (SC) of AlAlg composite was found to be 17.45 mg/g and shows enhanced SC than CaAlg composite which posses the SC of 9.45 mg/g. The experimental datas were fitted to various isotherms and kinetic models. The nature of chromium sorption was explained by the calculated values of thermodynamic parameters and the feasible chromium sorption mechanism was also established.