GO/PAMAM as a High Capacity Adsorbent for Removal of Alizarin Red S: Selective Separation of Dyes

Adsorption of Alizarin Red S (ARS) on graphene oxide/poly(amidoamine) (GO/PAMAM) was studied at different ARS initial concentrations, temperatures, pHs, shaking rates and contact times. Adsorption sites of GO/PAMAM were phenolic -OHgroup of GO and amine groups (-NH2, -NH3+ and -NHR2+) of PAMAM dendrimer moieties of GO/PAMAM. At pH = 2 and 318 K, maximum adsorption capacity of the adsorbent was 1275.2 mg g-1 which is one of the highest capacity in the literature. Thus, GO/PAMAM in this work acted as a superadsorbent for ARS. At the incipient of adsorption, molecules were adsorbed on sites that was reaction-controlled step, (Ea = 114.5 kJ mol-1). Adsorption of on the remaining sites was diffusion-controlled. In alkaline media, two other types of ARS molecules were identified during that were adsorbed on and sites. Further increasing the pH of the solution, decreased the number these two sites and yielded a reduced adsorption capacity . Methylene blue (MB), thionine (Th), pyronin Y (PY), acridine orange (AO), methyl blue (MEB) and janus green (JG) dyes were selectively separated from their mixtures with ARS molecules using GO/PAMAM at pH of 2. The used adsorbent was recycled efficiently by using ethylenediamine very fast.