Adsorption of acid fuchsine dye from wastewater by Mg-ferrite particles

Adsorption is a widely applied waste water treatment technology, especially for removing micro-pollutants and dyes of industrial effluents. Over the past decade, adsorbing metal oxide micron- and nano-particles have been successfully developed and investigated as adsorbents. In the present research, Mg-ferrite adsorbent particles were synthesized and their properties were fully determined. The pore volume is 0.139 cm³/g. The BET analysis reveals a surface area of 94.4 m²/g. The porosity is of meso- and microporous nature. The adsorbent was used to adsorb acid fuchsine, an important industrial dye. The equilibrium adsorption capacity was 796.4 mg/g, with an adsorption yield of 78.7-82.0%. The adsorption kinetics can be adequately fitted by a pseudo-second-order model. The isotherms of both Langmuir and Freundlich are applicable. The stability, recovery and reuse of the ferrite particles were proven in multi-cycle experiments, and the adsorption activity decreased by less than 3% between the first and fifth cycle. Experimental and fitting results were finally used to design a batch adsorber to remove a given concentration of acid fuchsine from different volumes of wastewater.