Study of the adsorption mechanisms of ciprofloxacin antibiotics onto graphitic ordered mesoporous carbons

•Pitch resin and anthracene were used as carbon precursor for mesoporous carbon synthesis.•The hydrophobic interaction was the dominant mechanism in adsorption process.•The OMCs are very effective adsorbents used to remove the CIP antibiotic from aqueous solution.

Pitch resin and anthracene were used as carbon precursor to fabricate ordered mesoporous carbon (OMC) by a nanocasting process using hard template method. Static and kinetic studies on adsorption of ciprofloxacin (CIP) on two graphitic mesoporous carbons are performed. The results exhibited that OMC prepared with pitch resin as carbon precursor was more efficient than the latter. The maximum adsorption capacity (Qm) of OMC1 and OMC2 were 236 mg/g and 187 mg/g, respectively. The adsorption of CIP increased with the increase of their neutral or zwitterionic formed on the adsorbents. The result indicated that adsorption of CIP onto the two adsorbents fitted better with the Langmuir model. The sorption process follows pseudo second-order kinetic model.

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