Synthesis and Characterization of Fe3O4- SiO2 Nanoparticles as Adsorbent Material for Methyl Blue Dye Removal from Aqueous Solutions

In this work, Fe3O4-SiO2 nanoparticles were synthesized, characterized, and applied as adsorbent material to remove methyl blue stain from an aqueous solution. The prepared nanoparticles were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscope (SEM), transmission electron microscope (TEM), and Brunauer–Emmett–Teller (BET) to determine the physical surface properties and correlate them to the adsorption efficiency. In addition, this study investigated the influence of several parameters on the removal percentage and adsorption capacity. Specifically, this study investigated the impact of changing the following parameters: pH (1 – 8), agitation speed (Uspeed; 100 - 350 rpm), initial methyl blue (MB) concentration (1 - 100 mg/L), adsorbent dose (0.05 to 0.15 g), and contact time (10 - 100 min). The characterization study reveals that the prepared material has an excellent surface area (385 ± 5 m2/g) and pore volume (0.31 cm3/g) which enhances the adsorption capacity. In addition, the prepared material showed excellent efficiency where the removal percentage reached 99.0±1% at the optimal operating conditions and the maximum adsorption capacity was 40 mg/g. This study delivers a full elucidation of the adsorption of MB dye by Fe3O4-SiO2 NPs which considers a promising inexpensive adsorbent. It also delivers important insight information about the adsorption process and the influence of each parameter, which fill the lack in this field.