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Enhanced heavy metal adsorption ability of lignocellulosic hydrogel adsorbents by the structural support effect of lignin

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Abstract

Cellulose beads possess some adsorption capacities for heavy metal ions, but the effect of lignin remaining in the beads on the adsorption behavior is not clear yet. In this study, lignocellulosic and cellulosic hydrogel beads were prepared by ionic liquid (IL) dissolution and reconstitution in water and further functionalization through magnetization and carboxymethylation. Compared to pure cellulosic beads made from Kraft pulp and microcrystalline cellulose, the presence of lignin in the lignocellulosic beads from IL-extracted cellulose-rich material (CRM) helped support the porous structure, leading to a higher hydroxyl number and porosity, and thus higher efficacy in magnetization and carboxymethylation. CRM beads, therefore, exhibited greater Cu2+ and Pb2+ uptake than the cellulosic beads both before and after modification. However, excessive lignin in the beads prepared directly from poplar wood powder caused negative effects on the adsorption capacity due to agglomeration and occlusion of the adsorptive sites.

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Acknowledgments

Yanjun Xie thanks the financial support from the National Key Research and Development Program of China (2017YFD0600204).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory of Bio-based Material Science and Technology (Ministry of Education), College of Material Science and Engineering, Northeast Forestry University, 26 Hexing Road, Harbin, 150040, China

    Xiaoping Shen, Yanjun Xie & Xin Yi

  2. School of Engineering, Zhejiang A & F University, Lin’an, 311300, China

    Xiaoping Shen

  3. College of Materials and Energy, South China Agricultural University, 483 Wushan Road, Guangzhou, 510642, China

    Qingwen Wang

  4. Mari Signum Mid-Atlantic, LLC, 3204 Tower Oaks Boulevard, Rockville, MD, 20852, USA

    Julia L. Shamshina

  5. 525 Solutions, Inc., P.O. Box 2206, Tuscaloosa, AL, 35403, USA

    Robin D. Rogers

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  1. Xiaoping Shen
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  2. Yanjun Xie
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  3. Qingwen Wang
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  4. Xin Yi
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  5. Julia L. Shamshina
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Correspondence to Yanjun Xie or Qingwen Wang.

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Shen, X., Xie, Y., Wang, Q. et al. Enhanced heavy metal adsorption ability of lignocellulosic hydrogel adsorbents by the structural support effect of lignin. Cellulose 26, 4005–4019 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10570-019-02328-w

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10570-019-02328-w

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