Facile synthesis and characterization of thiol-functionalized graphene oxide as effective adsorbent for Hg(II)

•The method was successfully applied in sea, river and pond water.•The method was successfully applied to fish tissues sample.•The MBT-GO adsorbent could be reused for 3 adsorption-desorption cycles.•Physico-chemical characterization of the adsorbent was studied in detail.•The maximum adsorption capacity was found to be 107.52 mg g−1

In this work, we report the synthesized and characterization of mercaptobenzothiazole (MBT) functionalized graphene oxide (GO) as a novel adsorbent material for the adsorption of Hg(II). This adsorption process could be realized with GO and MBT acting as host-guest in the first instance followed by the subsequent complexation of Hg(II) with MBT, the soft–soft interaction between Hg(II) & sulphur enhances the effective complexation. The prepared graphene-based adsorbent was characterised by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), Raman spectroscopy, Powder-X-ray diffraction (Powder-XRD), Transmission electron microscopes (TEM), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), UV–vis spectroscopy, scanning electron microscopes (SEM) and energy-dispersive X-ray analysis (EDX). The capability of ICP-MS for Hg(II) adsorption was extensively studied under different optimal parameters, the developed method was successfully applied to mercury adsorption from water samples.

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