In this study, the potential of adsorption of amoxicillin antibiotic (AMOX) from aqueous solutions using prepared activated carbon (AC) was studied. The used AC was prepared from an inexpensive and available precursor (sunflower seed hulls (SSH)) and activated by potassium hydroxide (KOH). The prepared AC was examined for its ability to remove AMOX from aqueous contaminated solutions and characterized with the aid of N2 -adsorption/desorption isotherm Brunauer–Emmett– Teller, scanning electron microscopy, energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy and Fourier-transform infrared. Zeta potential of the prepared activated carbon from sunflower seed hulls (SSHAC) were studied in relation to AMOX adsorption. The physical and chemical properties of SSHAC were analyzed and it showed successful preparation of SSHAC with a preferable surface area, micropores volume and average pore diameter of 928.706 m2 /g, 0.565 cm3 /g and 2.55 nm, respectively due to the hierarchical porosity of the prepared adsorbent. SSHAC exhibited a removal percentage of 95% for AMOX at a solution pH of 6, SSHAC dosage of 0.75 g/L and an initial AMOX amount of 50 mg/L. Equilibrium analysis were performed in a batch model within the range of 5–9 solution pH, 0.25–1.25 mg/mL SSHAC dosage and 50–250 mg/L AMOX initial concentration. The experimental data obtained were analyzed by Langmuir, Freundlich and Temkin isotherm models. The equilibrium data fitted well with the Langmuir model with a maximum AMOX adsorption capacity of 272.44 mg/g. Pseudo-first-order, pseudo-second-order and intraparticle diffusion models were utilized to examine the kinetic data obtained at various inlet AMOX concentrations. The kinetic experimental data were well fitted with the pseudo-first-order equation. A proposed adsorption mechanism by π–π interactions were introduced. From the obtained results, SSHAC is recommended as a highly efficient adsorbent for removal of AMOX from aqueous solutions
Understanding, promoting, and teaching media literacy is an important societal challenge. STEM educators are increasingly looking to incorporate 21st century skills such as media literacy into core subject education. In this paper we investigate how undergraduate Computer Science (CS) students can learn media literacy as a by-product of collaborative video tutorial production. The paper presents a study of 34 third-year CS undergraduates who, as part of their learning, were each asked to produce three video tutorials on Raspberry Pi programming, using a collaborative video production tool for mobile phones (Bootlegger). We provide results of both quantitative and qualitative analysis of the production process and resulting video tutorials,
... Show MoreThe current research aims to show the impact of the international auditing standard IAS 540 in reducing income smoothing practices in Iraq. To achieve the objectives of the research, the researcher adopted a questionnaire for a sample of auditors in Iraq. Where 60 forms were distributed and after the questionnaire was retrieved and statistical analysis was done using the SPSS program, The research reached a number of results, the most important of which are: the existence of a statistically significant effect of the application of the international auditing standard IAS 540 in reducing income smoothing practices, The research recommended the necess
... Show More Educational services in Iraq face many problems that have reduced the efficiency of the educational process, as a result of the difficult conditions experienced by educational services in Iraq. This led to the accumulation of these problems and their exacerbation significantly over the years, as there was no fundamental solution to these problems. The study proposes a planning method for managing the educational system in Iraq, especially for the primary and secondary levels, where these negative phenomena are very prominent, especially the deficit in school buildings and the phenomenon of overcrowding in classrooms. &am
... Show MoreThe present work reports an approach of hydrothermal growth of ZnO nanorods, which simplifies the production of low cost films with controlled morphology for H2S gas sensor application. The prepared ZnO nanorods exhibit a hexagonal wurtzite phase analyzed by the X-ray diffraction analysis. The FTIR spectra provide information that the band located between 465-570 cm-1 corresponds to the stretching bond of Zn-O, which confirms the creation of ZnO. PL spectroscopic studies showed that the doping of Ag NPs and f-MWCNT in the ZnO matrix leads to the tuning of the bandgap. The SEM analysis showed the morphology of ZnO was the nanorods. The nanocomposites Ag/ZnO and F-MWCNT/ZnO which prepared, sep
... Show MoreSemiconductor-based photocatalytic processes are widely applied as ecofriendly technology for degrading organic pollutants. Establishing photocatalytic heterojunctions with Z-type photocarriers transfer pathways is projected to be a superb strategy to enhance photocatalytic behavior. In this paper, novel and stable (0D/2D) heterojunctions of CoS-embedded boron-doped g-C3N4 (CoS/BCN) with a high rate of charges transfer/separation were assembled for degradation of malachite green dye (MG). The CoS/BCN photocatalyst achieves a photodegradation efficiency of 96.9 % within 1 h of LED illumination, which is 2.5 and 1.4-fold enhancement compared with bare g-C3N4 and BCN, respectively. Besides, the results of species-trapping trials exhibited that
... Show MoreIt is often noted that disordered materials have different chemical properties to their more “ordered” cousins. Quantifying these effects in terms of thermodynamics is challenging in part because disordered materials can be difficult to characterize and are frequently relatively unstable. During the course of our experiments to understand the effects of disorder in catalysts for water oxidation we observed that many disordered manganese and cobalt oxide water oxidation catalysts directly oxidized peroxide in contrast to their more ordered analogues which catalyzed its disproportionation, that is, MnO2+2H+ +H2O2! Mn2+ +2H2O+O2(oxidation) versus H2O2!H2O+1=2 O2(disproportionation). By measuring the efficiency for one reaction over the oth
... Show MoreIn this work Polyynes was synthesized by pulse laser ablation of graphite target in ethanol solution. UV-Visible Spectrophotometer, Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR) and Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) were used to study the optical absorption, chemical bonding, particle size and the morphology. UV absorption peaks coincide with the electronic transitions corresponding to linear hydrogen – capped polyyne (Cn+1H2), the absorption peaks intensity increased when the polyynes were produced at different laser energies and the formation rats of polyynes increased with the increasing of laser pulse number. The FTIR absorption peak at 2368.4 cm-1, 1640.0 cm-1 and 1276.
... Show MoreThe solvent free oxidation of benzyl alcohol was conducted employing Au and Pd supported catalysts, while utilizing hydrogen peroxide 35% (H2O2) as the oxidant, H2O2 is very cheap, mild, and an environment friendly reagent, which produced water as the only by-product. Various proportions of Au-Pd catalysts on carbon and titanium oxide activated as supports were synthesized through the use of sol immobilization catalyst synthesis technique. Characterization of the synthesized catalysts was performed using X-Ray Diffraction (XRD), Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET), Field Emission Scanning Electron Microscopy (FESEM), and Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM). It was found that the synthesized Au-Pd/ activated carbon catalyst was benef
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