Reduction and reoxidation of humic acid: influence on spectroscopic properties and proton binding

Previous studies on proton and metal binding to humic substances have not considered a potential influence of reduction and oxidation of functional groups. Therefore, we investigated how proton binding of a purified soil humic acid was affected by reduction. Reduction of the humic acid was carried out using an electrochemical cell that allowed us to measure the amounts of electrons and protons involved in reduction reactions. We further applied spectroscopic methods (UV-vis, fluorescence, FT-IR, C-1s NEXAFS) to detect possible chemical changes in the humic acid induced by reduction and reoxidation. The effect of reduction on proton binding was determined with acid-base titrations in the pH range 4-10 under controlled redox conditions. During reduction, 0.54 mol kg(-1) protons and 0.55 mol kg(-1) electrons were transferred to humic acid. NICA-Donnan modeling revealed an equivalent increase in proton-reactive sites (0.52 mol kg(-1)) in the alkaline pH-range. Our results indicate that reduction of humic acid increased the amount of proton-reactive sites by 15% compared to the untreated state. Spectroscopic differences between the untreated and reduced humic acid were minor, apart from a lower UV-vis absorption of the reduced humic acid between 400 and 700 nm.