Study on CM-chitosan/activated carbon hybrid gel films formed with EB irradiation

A series of novel hybrid gel films were prepared from carboxymethylated chitosan (CM-chitosan) and activated carbon (AC) by irradiation of compression-molded CM-chitosan/AC mixture in physical gel state with electron beam (EB) at room temperature. The formation, properties and structure of CM-chitosan/AC hybrid gel films were discussed in terms of gel fraction, swelling, mechanical property, SEM image and XPS spectra. Compared with pure crosslinked CM-chitosan gel, the gel fraction and mechanical property of the hybrid sample were obviously improved after adding AC into CM-chitosan film. The morphology analyses indicated that the hybrid gel films exhibited a rough and folded surface and a relatively interior uniform structure was sustained between CM-chitosan and AC. XPS revealed that the content of protonated amino groups of CM-chitosan macromolecule was promoted by AC. In addition, the adsorptive property of the gel films against humic acid was investigated by batch adsorption method. It was found that the adsorption efficiency of CM-chitosan is significantly improved by adding AC. These preliminary evaluations suggest that the CM-chitosan/AC gel films have great potential for applications in industrial field and biomedical field.