Arsenic (As) contamination of water and foodstuff has
motivated
the development of methods to sense, quantify, and/or remediate As
contamination in such samples. Nanoscale zero-valent iron (nZVI) particles
have recently emerged as a suitable material for adsorbing As. In
order to enhance its performance, these nanoparticles were assembled
into reduced graphene oxide (rGO) sheets via a direct iron reduction
to yield nZVI/rGO materials. Transmission electron microscopy images
showed that nZVI particles of 7 nm mean particle size were well dispersed
over the rGO sheets. Zeta potential was measured in a pH range from
2 to 12 and showed a point of zero charge at pHpzc 6.5. As adsorption
onto nZVI/rGO materials, using 15 ppm As solutions of pH ranging from
3.6 to 7.9, showed that adsorption is better in acidic pH, reaching
approximately 80% of As adsorption in 10 min. Density functional theory
calculations were carried out to evaluate the As adsorption over nZVI/rGO
by using simplified models of magnetite nanoparticles supported on
graphene. As bonds to surface oxygen atoms and adsorption are greatly
favorable near lattice defects, with adsorption energies between −6.61
and −6.44 eV. After adsorption, As transfers electron density
to the surface, resulting in a positive charge of +3.
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