The solar photocatalytic degradation of diuron, which is one of the herbicides, has been studied by a solar pilot plant in heterogeneous solar photocatalysis with titanium dioxide. The pilot plant was made up of compound parabolic collectors specially designed for solar photocatalytic applications. The influence of different variables such as, H2O2 initial concentration, TiO2 initial concentration, and diuron initial concentration with their relationship to the degradation efficiency were studied. Hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) found to increase the rate of diuron degradation. The best removal efficiency of heterogeneous solar photocatalytic TiO2 system was found to be 46.65 % and for heterogeneous solar photocatalytic TiO2/ H2O2 system was fo

The effect of metal nanoparticles on the anaerobic digestion of sludge and the sludge bacterial community are still not well-understood, and both improvements and inhibitions have been reported. This study investigated the impact of 2, 10, and 30 mg/g TS silver and copper oxide nanoparticles (AgNPs and CuONPs) on the mesophilic anaerobic digestion of sludge and the bacterial community structure. The reactors were monitored for changes in tCOD, sCOD, TS, VS, biogas generation, and cell viability. Also, the relative abundance and taxonomic distribution of the bacterial communities were analyzed at the phylum and genus levels, including the genera involved in anaerobic digestion. Both AgNPs and CuONPs exhibited some inhibition on anaer

A batch and flow injection (FI) spectrophotometric methods are described for the determination of barbituric acid in aqueous and urine samples. The method is based on the oxidative coupling reaction of barbituric acid with 4-aminoantipyrine and potassium iodate to form purple water soluble stable product at λ 510 nm. Good linearity for both methods was obtained ranging from 2 to 60 μg mL−1, 5–100 μg mL−1 for batch and FI techniques, respectively. The limit of detection (signal/noise = 3) of 0.45 μg mL−1 for batch method and 0.48 μg mL−1 for FI analysis was obtained. The proposed methods were applied successfully for the determination of barbituric acid in tap water, river water, and urine samples with good recoveries of 99.92

The interest of application of liquid membrane (pertraction) processes for recovery of medicinal compounds from dilute ammoniacal leach solutions is demonstrated. Selectivity of the liquid membrane ensures a preferential transport of the desired solute from the native extract into the strip solution, vinblastine was successfully extracted from basic media (pH 9.2) and stripped by acidic media of sulfuric acid (pH= 1.3) applying continuous pertraction in a rotating discs contactor and using n-decane as liquid membrane. Transport of vinblastine in three-liquid-phase system was studied and performed by means of a kinetic model involving two consecutive irreversible first-order reactions. The kinetic parameters (apparent rate constants of th

In this study, the ability of pistachio shells, as an unconventional adsorbent, to recover thallium cations from contaminated aqueous solutions was investigated. To achieve the objective of the study, practical experiments were conducted using a batch-mode adsorption unit under various operating conditions. The results obtained showed that the pistachio shells have the ability to remove thallium cations with a high efficiency exceeding 86% at room temperature. The results indicated that the maximum treatment efficiency was achieved at values of 7, 350 rpm, 86 ppm, 5 g, 150 min of pH, agitation speed, initial concentration of thallium, dosage of pistachio shell used, and contact time, respectively. Morphological results confirmed tha

The 3D electro-Fenton technique is, due to its high efficiency, one of the technologies suggested to eliminate organic pollutants in wastewater. The type of particle electrode used in the 3D electro-Fenton process is one of the most crucial variables because of its effect on the formation of reactive species and the source of iron ions. The electrolytic cell in the current study consisted of graphite as an anode, carbon fiber (CF) modified with graphene as a cathode, and iron foam particles as a third electrode. A response surface methodology (RSM) approach was used to optimize the 3D electro-Fenton process. The RSM results revealed that the quadratic model has a high R2 of 99.05 %. At 4 g L-1 iron foam particles, time of 5 h, and