One pot synthesis of chitosan grafted quaternized resin for the removal of nitrate and phosphate from aqueous solution

The present study deals with the synthesis of chitosan quaternized resin for efficient removal of nitrate and phosphate from aqueous solution. The resin was characterized with FTIR, SEM with EDX and XRD. Batch method was carried out to optimize various parameters such as contact time, initial concentration of nitrate and phosphate, dosage, pH, co-anions and temperature on the adsorption capacity of the adsorbent. The adsorption process illustrated that the Freundlich isotherm and the pseudo-second order are the best fitted models for the sorption of both anions. The respective negative values of ΔH° and ΔG° revealed that the adsorption of both the anions were exothermic and spontaneous. The removal efficiency of nitrate and phosphate on chitosan quaternized resin were 78% and 90% respectively with 0.1 g of adsorbent and the initial concentration as 100 mg/L. Nitrate and phosphate anions adsorbed effectively on chitosan quaternized resin by replacing Cl− ions from quaternary site through electrostatic attraction as well as ion-exchange mechanism. Hydrogen bonding also played important role in adsorption process. Even after 7th regeneration cycle the adsorbent retained its adsorption capacity as 23.7 mg/g and 30.4 mg/g for both nitrate and phosphate respectively.