Neonicotinoid insecticides as emerging contaminants in agricultural soil

Using an LC-MS-MS method for detection of 6 neonicotinoid insecticides (imidacloprid, dinotefuran, acetamiprid, clothianidin, thiamethoxam, nitenpyram) was developed a new performant extraction method based on sonication treatment of soil samples, which were previously dried, grounded, homogenized, sieved (2 mm) and subjected to the selective extraction process with acetonitrile. Then the obtained extracts were diluted with ultrapure water (ratio 1: 100) and subjected to purification by Strata C18 SPE extraction using cartridges loaded with 200 mg/6 mL of octa-dodecyl-silica adsorbent phase. The entire methodology allowed obtaining quantification limits at trace level that varied in the range 0.3-0.9 ng/g and recoveries between 71.4% and 109.6%. In the agricultural soil samples, taken from the lands cultivated with wheat, corn, sunflower, beans, located in Prahova and Giurgiu counties (Romania), only four neonicotinoids out of the total of six were quantified imidacloprid (0.38 ng/g-56.9 ng/g), acetamiprid (1.7-7.2 ng/g), thiamethoxam (1.05-6.7 ng/g), clothianidin (1.1-1.5 ng/g).

Novel cobalt–carbon@silica adsorbent

Recently, carbon nanostructures are of high importance due to their unique characteristics and interesting applications. Pyrolysis of anthracene with cobalt complex Co(2,2′-bipy)Cl2(1), where (2,2′-bipy) is 2,2′-bipyridine, in the absence and presence of silica gave in high yield cobalt-carbon nanocomposite CoCNC (2) and CoCNC@SiO2(3) at 600 °C and 850 °C, respectively. They were characterized using SEM, TEM, PXRD, Raman and XPS. (3) and (2) contain core–shell cobalt(0)/cobalt oxide-graphite with or without silica support. PXRD indicates that (2) contains crystalline hexagonal α-Co and cubic β-Co phases while (3) contains only cubic β-Co phase and silica. The structure of (2) is 3D hierarchical carbon architecture wrapping spherical and elliptical cobalt nanoparticles. (3) consists of graphitized structures around cobalt nanoparticles embedded in the silica matrix. XPS reveals that the nanocomposites contain oxygen functional groups that enhance uptake of cationic dyes. CoCNC@SiO2(3) has higher capacity and thus is better adsorbent of Basic Violet 3 than CoCNC (2). The Langmuir adsorption capacity of (3) is 19.4 mg g−1 while column capacity is 12.55 mg g−1 at 25 °C. Freundlich isotherm and pseudo-second-order kinetic models fit well the adsorption data. Thermodynamics indicate that adsorption(3) is exothermic. Column regeneration was tested for three cycles and Yan et al. was found the best kinetic model.

Removal of Iron From Produced Water Using Silica Adsorbent Material

The removal of Iron from produced water using adsorbent materials is taking a space of attention from the perspective of researchers. In this work, the characterization of chemically modified silica used as Iron ions adsorbent using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), laser granularity instrument was performed. The point of zero charge (PZC) of modified silica was determined using titration method. Different parameters were used to better approach Iron removal. These parameters are 0.2 and 0.4 mg/l modified silica adsorbent dose, 30-180 min adsorption time and pH values of 4-10. The results showed that modified silica exhibited higher removal efficiency of Iron due to its surface characteristics. The results also showed that at 60 min adsorption time and pH 7, the maximum Iron removal efficiency with 99.99% and 99.98% was obtained using modified silica dose of 0.4 mg/l and 0.2 mg/l, respectively.