Pharmaceuticals have been widely remaining contaminants in wastewater, and diclofenac is the most common pharmaceutical pollutant. Therefore, the removal of diclofenac from aqueous solutions using activated carbon produced by pyrocarbonic acid and microwaves was investigated in this research. Apricot seed powder and pyrophosphoric acid (45 wt%) were selected as raw material and activator respectively, and microwave irradiation technique was used to prepare the activated carbon. The raw material was impregnated in pyrophosphoric acid at 80◦C with an impregnation ratio of 1: 3 (apricot seeds to phosphoric acid), the impregnation time was 4 h, whereas the power of the microwave was 700 watts with a radiation time of 20 min. A series of experiments were conducted at constant mixing speed (300 revolutions per minute) to evaluate the effect of experimental factors likes, adsorption time, pH of diclofenac solution, diclofenac initial concentration, and dosage of activated carbon on removal efficiency. The design of experiments (version 13 Stat-Ease) was implemented using the central composite method to define the optimum effect of the process factors on the removal efficiency. The analysis of variance showed that the quadratic model for the experiment was significant with a very low probability value (P- value < 0.0001). The adjusted R2 of the model was 0.9826 and the predicted R2 was 0.9574. Whereas the optimum conditions suggested by the model for the process variable were found to be 150 min, 3.25 pH, 30 mg/L, 0.267g, for adsorption time, pH of diclofenac solution, diclofenac initial concentration, a dosage of activated carbon, respectively and the maximum removal efficiency was found to be 94.6%. The data obtained from the experiments were fitted with Langmuir and Freundlich models and the results show that the data was well fitted Langmuir model with R2 = 0.9685 as compared to the Freundlich model which has R2 = 0.93249. Likewise, the data was analyzed by pseudo first and second-order kinetic models and the results show that the adsorption on apricot-activated carbon was well adequate with the pseudo-second-order model.
Background:Amino acid disorders are a major group of inborn error metabolism (IEM) with variable clinical presentation; its diagnosis constitutes a real challenge in a community with high consanguinity rate and no systematic newborn screening.
Objectives: to provide data about amino acid disorders detected in high-risk Iraqi children by using quantitative amino acid fluorescent high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) analysis.
Type of the study: Cross-sectional study.
Methods: a descriptive cross sectional study from 1st February to 1st December 2014, at Neurological ward and clinic of the Children Welfare teaching Hospital, in Baghdad - Ira
... Show MoreThe study discussed here deals with the isolation of Aspergillus niger from palm dates, the formal and the most famous fruit in Iraq, to test and qualify this fungus isolate for its ability to produce citric acid. Submerged fermentation technique was used in the fermentation process. A.niger isolated from “Zahdi” Palme dates was used in the study of the fermentation kinetics to get the production efficiency of citric acid. Kinetics of CA production via fermentation by A. niger S11 was evaluated within 432 h fermentation time and under submerged conditions of 11% (w/v) sucrose, 5% (v/v) inoculum size, pH 4, 30 °C and 150 rpm. The maximum citric acid produced was (37.116 g/l). Kine
Electrochemical Grinding (ECG) process is a mechanically assisted electrochemical process for material processing. The process is able to successfully machine electrically conducting harder materials at faster rate with improved surface finish and dimensional control. This research studies the effect of applied current, electrolyte concentration, spindle speed and the gap between workpiece and tool on hardness and material removal rate during electrochemical grinding for stainless steel 316. The characteristic features of the electrochemical grinding process are explored through Taguchi-design-based experimental studies. The better hardness can be obtained at 10 A of the current, 150 g/l of the electrolyte concentration, 0.3 mm of gap an
... Show MoreThe seed propagation is the predominant method of Echinacea propagation, which has been criticized for its time-consuming control over the separation factor and the uncertainty of pathogen-free plants produced by this method. The technology of tissue culture has provided multiple opportunities for the production of secondary metabolites continuously without being restricted to a specific season, due to the possibility of controlling the environmental conditions and the components of the nutrient medium needed by the plant. This study was conducted to investigate the effects of salicylic acid as elicitor and tyrosine as precursor on propagation and some secondary compounds production in coneflower in vitro. The result showed the superiori
... Show MorePathological blood clot in blood vessels, which often leads to cardiovascular diseases, are one of the most common causes of death in humans. Therefore, enzymatic therapy to degrade blood clots is vital. To achieve this goal, bromelain was immobilized and used for the biodegradation of blood clots. Bromelain was extracted from the pineapple fruit pulp (Ananas comosus) and purified by ion exchange chromatography after precipitation with ammonium sulphate (0-80 %), resulting in a yield of 70%, purification fold of 1.42, and a specific activity of 1175 U/mg. Bromelain was covalently immobilized on functionalized multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNT), with an enzyme loading of 71.35%. The results of the characterization of free and immobilized
... Show MoreCopper is a cheaper alternative to various noble metals with a range of potential applications in the field of nanoscience and nanotechnology. However, copper nanoparticles have major limitations, which include rapid oxidation on exposure to air. Therefore, alternative pathways have been developed to synthesize metal nanoparticles in the presence of polymers and surfactants as stabilizers, and to form coatings on the surface of nanoparticles. These surfactants and polymeric ligands are made from petrochemicals which are non- renewable. As fossil resources are limited, finding renewable and biodegradable alternative is promising.The study aimed at preparing, characterizing and evaluating the antibacterial properties of copper nanoparticle
... Show MoreMultiple eliminations (de-multiple) are one of seismic processing steps to remove their effects and delineate the correct primary refractors. Using normal move out to flatten primaries is the way to eliminate multiples through transforming these data to frequency-wavenumber domain. The flatten primaries are aligned with zero axis of the frequency-wavenumber domain and any other reflection types (multiples and random noise) are distributed elsewhere. Dip-filter is applied to pass the aligned data and reject others will separate primaries from multiple after transforming the data back from frequency-wavenumber domain to time-distance domain. For that, a suggested name for this technique as normal move out- frequency-wavenumber domain
... Show MoreZinc is one of the essential trace elements, it plays a key role in many biochemical and functional processes. It is less harmful than many other minerals, in the case of exposure to high doses of zinc, poisoning occurs, and this poisoning may mostly result from the accidental ingestion of household products containing zinc or nutritional supplements, this study was conducted to find out the effects of zinc on the concentration of amino acid. A total of 30 adult white mouse males were taken and divided into three groups; the first group (control) of 10 mice taken with distilled water for 30 days, the second group includes 10 mice that were dose with Zn drug concentration of 50 mg/kg/day for 30 days, the third group includes 10 mice that wer
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