scholarly journals Nanotechnology in Wastewater Management: A New Paradigm Towards Wastewater Treatment

Molecules ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 26 (6) ◽  
pp. 1797
Author(s):  
Keerti Jain ◽  
Anand S. Patel ◽  
Vishwas P. Pardhi ◽  
Swaran Jeet Singh Flora

Clean and safe water is a fundamental human need for multi-faceted development of society and a thriving economy. Brisk rises in populations, expanding industrialization, urbanization and extensive agriculture practices have resulted in the generation of wastewater which have not only made the water dirty or polluted, but also deadly. Millions of people die every year due to diseases communicated through consumption of water contaminated by deleterious pathogens. Although various methods for wastewater treatment have been explored in the last few decades but their use is restrained by many limitations including use of chemicals, formation of disinfection by-products (DBPs), time consumption and expensiveness. Nanotechnology, manipulation of matter at a molecular or an atomic level to craft new structures, devices and systems having superior electronic, optical, magnetic, conductive and mechanical properties, is emerging as a promising technology, which has demonstrated remarkable feats in various fields including wastewater treatment. Nanomaterials encompass a high surface to volume ratio, a high sensitivity and reactivity, a high adsorption capacity, and ease of functionalization which makes them suitable for application in wastewater treatment. In this article we have reviewed the techniques being developed for wastewater treatment using nanotechnology based on adsorption and biosorption, nanofiltration, photocatalysis, disinfection and sensing technology. Furthermore, this review also highlights the fate of the nanomaterials in wastewater treatment as well as risks associated with their use.

2009 ◽  
Vol 2009 ◽  
pp. 1-24 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yun Wang ◽  
John T. W. Yeow

Gas sensors have attracted intensive research interest due to the demand of sensitive, fast response, and stable sensors for industry, environmental monitoring, biomedicine, and so forth. The development of nanotechnology has created huge potential to build highly sensitive, low cost, portable sensors with low power consumption. The extremely high surface-to-volume ratio and hollow structure of nanomaterials is ideal for the adsorption of gas molecules. Particularly, the advent of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) has fuelled the inventions of gas sensors that exploit CNTs' unique geometry, morphology, and material properties. Upon exposure to certain gases, the changes in CNTs' properties can be detected by various methods. Therefore, CNTs-based gas sensors and their mechanisms have been widely studied recently. In this paper, a broad but yet in-depth survey of current CNTs-based gas sensing technology is presented. Both experimental works and theoretical simulations are reviewed. The design, fabrication, and the sensing mechanisms of the CNTs-based gas sensors are discussed. The challenges and perspectives of the research are also addressed in this review.


2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (17) ◽  
pp. 5889
Author(s):  
Sunghun Cho ◽  
Jun Seop Lee

Biosensors are of particular importance for the detection of biological analytes at low concentrations. Conducting polymer nanomaterials, which often serve as sensing transducers, are renowned for their small dimensions, high surface-to-volume ratio, and amplified sensitivity. Despite these traits, the widespread implementation of conventional conducting polymer nanomaterials is hampered by their scarcity and lack of structural uniformity. Herein, a brief overview of the latest developments in the synthesis of morphologically tunable conducting polymer-based biosensors is discussed. Research related to the dimensional (0, 1, 2, and 3D) hetero-nanostructures of conducting polymers are highlighted in this paper, and how these structures affect traits such as the speed of charge transfer processes, low-working temperature, high sensitivity and cycle stability are discussed.


2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Justin Yang ◽  
Yvonne Wei ◽  
Catherine Yeh ◽  
Florence Liou ◽  
William Chen ◽  
...  

AbstractThe small size of nanoparticles is both an advantage and a problem. Their high surface-area-to-volume ratio enables novel medical, industrial, and commercial applications. However, their small size also allows them to evade conventional filtration during water treatment, posing health risks to humans, plants, and aquatic life. This project aims to remove nanoparticles during wastewater treatment using genetically modified Escherichia coli in two ways: 1) binding citrate-capped nanoparticles with the membrane protein Proteorhodopsin, and 2) trapping nanoparticles using Escherichia coli biofilm produced by overexpressing two regulators: OmpR234 and CsgD. We demonstrate experimentally that Escherichia coli expressing Proteorhodopsin binds to 60 nm citrate-capped silver nanoparticles. We also successfully upregulate biofilm production and show that Escherichia coli biofilms are able to trap 30 nm gold particles. Finally, both Proteorhodopsin and biofilm approaches are able to bind and remove nanoparticles in simulated wastewater treatment tanks. We envision integrating our trapping system in both rural and urban wastewater treatment plants to efficiently capture all nanoparticles before treated water is released into the environment.Financial DisclosureThis work was funded by the Taipei American School. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.Competing InterestsThe authors have declared that no competing interests exist.Ethics StatementN/AData AvailabilityYes – all data are fully available without restriction. Sequences for the plasmids used in this study are available through the Registry of Standard Biological Parts. Links to raw data are included in Supplementary Information.


2014 ◽  
Vol 995 ◽  
pp. 125-143 ◽  
Author(s):  
Md. Abdul Aziz ◽  
Munetaka Oyama

Nanomaterial based electrochemical method gain tremendous interest for the detection of biomolecules due to high sensitivity, selectivity, and low fabrication cost. High surface to volume ratio, excellent electrocatalytic properties of the nanomaterials plays important role for the sensitive and selective detection of biomolecules. For electrochemical biosensors, proper control of chemical, electrochemical and physical properties, as well as their functionalization and surface immobilization significantly influences the overall performance. This chapter gives an overview of the importance of the development of nanomaterials based electrochemical biosensors; particularly direct electrooxidation-or electroreduction-based biosensors, catalysis-based biosensors, and label-based affinity biosensors. In addition, fabrication methods including modification of electrode surface with nanomaterials, tailoring their physico-chemical properties, and functionalization with chemicals or biomolecules are also highlighted.


Proceedings ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 2 (13) ◽  
pp. 838 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jiushuai Xu ◽  
Maik Bertke ◽  
Xuejing Li ◽  
Andi Setiono ◽  
Michael Fahrbach ◽  
...  

This paper reports a piezoresistive silicon microcantilever-based gravimetric humidity sensor, where a ZnO nanofilm (200 nm) and ZnO nanorods (NRs) with different lengths (1.5 µm and 6 µm) modified with chitosan self-assembled monolayers (SAMs) are coated on the microcantilevers’ back surface as the sensing material. Thanks to the new sensor design, the resonant frequency (RF) shifts induced by the mass adsorption on the high surface-area-to-volume ratio, hybrid-sensing nanostructure can be tracked directly by monitoring the output of the p-diffused full Wheatstone bridge. By depositing ZnO NRs and Chitosan SAMs, direct-reading microcantilevers with high repeatability, reliability and high sensitivity (15 Hz/%RH) can be achieved.


2006 ◽  
Vol 934 ◽  
Author(s):  
Guoguang Rong ◽  
Jarkko J. Saarinen ◽  
John E. Sipe ◽  
Sharon M. Weiss

ABSTRACTPorous silicon (PSi) waveguides are fabricated as a new platform for high sensitivity biosensors. Biomolecules infiltrated into the PSi waveguide increase the effective refractive index of the waveguide and change the angle at which incident light couples into a waveguide mode. Due to the high surface area to volume ratio of PSi and the confinement of optical energy in the region where the biomolecules reside, the waveguide resonance is very sensitive to small concentrations of infiltrated molecular species. A resonance width below 0.1° has been obtained, which is sufficient to detect one monolayer of DNA covering the pore walls. In this work, a prism is used for the waveguide coupling in an arrangement that is similar to traditional surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensing. Theoretical analysis suggests that an optimized PSi waveguide resonant sensor will show a 60-fold improvement in sensitivity when compared to a conventional SPR sensor due to the enhanced interaction between the electromagnetic field and biological material.


Catalysts ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 135
Author(s):  
Zhibin Wen ◽  
Qianqian Zhu ◽  
Jiali Zhou ◽  
Shudi Zhao ◽  
Jinnan Wang ◽  
...  

Novel flower-shaped C-dots/Co3O4{111} with dual-reaction centers were constructed to improve the Fenton-like reaction activity and peroxymonosulfate (PMS) conversion to sulfate radicals. Due to the exposure of a high surface area and Co3O4{111} facets, flower-shaped C-dots/Co3O4{111} could provide more Co(II) for PMS activation than traditional spherical Co3O4{110}. Meanwhile, PMS was preferred for adsorption on Co3O4{111} facets because of a high adsorption energy and thereby facilitated the electron transfer from Co(II) to PMS. More importantly, the Co–O–C linkage between C-dots and Co3O4{111} induced the formation of the dual-reaction center, which promoted the production of reactive organic radicals (R•). PMS could be directly reduced to SO4−• by R• over C-dots. On the other hand, electron transferred from R• to Co via Co–O–C linkage could accelerate the redox of Co(II)/(III), avoiding the invalid decomposition of PMS. Thus, C-dots doped on Co3O4{111} improved the PMS conversion rate to SO4−• over the single active site, resulting in high turnover numbers (TONs). In addition, TPR analysis indicated that the optimal content of C-dots doped on Co3O4{111} is 2.5%. More than 99% of antibiotics and dyes were degraded over C-dots/Co3O4{111} within 10 min. Even after six cycles, C-dots/Co3O4{111} still remained a high catalytic activity.


Nanomaterials ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (6) ◽  
pp. 1540
Author(s):  
Muhammad Ahmad ◽  
Tehseen Nawaz ◽  
Mohammad Mujahid Alam ◽  
Yasir Abbas ◽  
Shafqat Ali ◽  
...  

The development of excellent drug adsorbents and clarifying the interaction mechanisms between adsorbents and adsorbates are greatly desired for a clean environment. Herein, we report that a reduced graphene oxide modified sheeted polyphosphazene (rGO/poly (cyclotriphosphazene-co-4,4′-sulfonyldiphenol)) defined as PZS on rGO was used to remove the tetracycline (TC) drug from an aqueous solution. Compared to PZS microspheres, the adsorption capacity of sheeted PZS@rGO exhibited a high adsorption capacity of 496 mg/g. The adsorption equilibrium data well obeyed the Langmuir isotherm model, and the kinetics isotherm was fitted to the pseudo-second-order model. Thermodynamic analysis showed that the adsorption of TC was an exothermic, spontaneous process. Furthermore, we highlighted the importance of the surface modification of PZS by the introduction of rGO, which tremendously increased the surface area necessary for high adsorption. Along with high surface area, electrostatic attractions, H-bonding, π-π stacking and Lewis acid-base interactions were involved in the high adsorption capacity of PZS@rGO. Furthermore, we also proposed the mechanism of TC adsorption via PZS@rGO.


2021 ◽  
Vol 22 (12) ◽  
pp. 6357
Author(s):  
Kinga Halicka ◽  
Joanna Cabaj

Sensors and biosensors have found applications in many areas, e.g., in medicine and clinical diagnostics, or in environmental monitoring. To expand this field, nanotechnology has been employed in the construction of sensing platforms. Because of their properties, such as high surface area to volume ratio, nanofibers (NFs) have been studied and used to develop sensors with higher loading capacity, better sensitivity, and faster response time. They also allow to miniaturize designed platforms. One of the most commonly used techniques of the fabrication of NFs is electrospinning. Electrospun NFs can be used in different types of sensors and biosensors. This review presents recent studies concerning electrospun nanofiber-based electrochemical and optical sensing platforms for the detection of various medically and environmentally relevant compounds, including glucose, drugs, microorganisms, and toxic metal ions.


Author(s):  
Cynthia Nagy ◽  
Robert Huszank ◽  
Attila Gaspar

AbstractThis paper aims at studying open channel geometries in a layer-bed-type immobilized enzyme reactor with computer-aided simulations. The main properties of these reactors are their simple channel pattern, simple immobilization procedure, regenerability, and disposability; all these features make these devices one of the simplest yet efficient enzymatic microreactors. The high surface-to-volume ratio of the reactor was achieved using narrow (25–75 μm wide) channels. The simulation demonstrated that curves support the mixing of solutions in the channel even in strong laminar flow conditions; thus, it is worth including several curves in the channel system. In the three different designs of microreactor proposed, the lengths of the channels were identical, but in two reactors, the liquid flow was split to 8 or 32 parallel streams at the inlet of the reactor. Despite their overall higher volumetric flow rate, the split-flow structures are advantageous due to the increased contact time. Saliva samples were used to test the efficiencies of the digestions in the microreactors. Graphical abstract


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