Abstract
The present work aimed to treat cellulose chemically to obtain a magnetic cellulose sorbent that possesses improved textural and adsorption properties towards Cu(II) ions from their aqueous solutions. For these purposes, magnetic cellulose was modified via chlorination followed by functionalization with amine moieties to obtain amine functionalized cellulose (Cell N). The amine group concentration on the resins was determined. The structure of the prepared resin was investigated using Fourier transform infrared, Energy Dispersive X-ray microanalysis (EDX), N-2 adsorption-desorption, and scanning electron microscopy. Batch experiments were performed to examine the uptake behavior of Cu(II) ions from their aqueous solutions using the investigated resin. The maximum uptake capacity was recorded at the optimum pH value of 5.8 and was found to be 2.4 mmol/g with fast kinetics (after 20 minutes of the batch experiment). Magnetic properties of Cell-N made resin easy to be collected from the media of batch experiments simply by using an external magnet. The studied resin showed high selectivity towards Cu(II) ions over other interfering ions in their solution and good durability towards mineral acids. Besides, the studied resin was regenerated efficiently where a nearly complete regeneration of Cu(II) ions was achieved using 0.5M HNO3 solution for several cycles.