Optimizing microwave-assisted production of waste-based activated carbons for the removal of antibiotics from water

Renewable biomass-derived carbon-based hosts for lithium–sulfur batteries

“…Compared with traditional xed-bed heating, microwaveassisted heating can achieve accelerated chemical reaction rates at lower temperatures, and microwave heating generates CO, H 2 and many other gases, which will greatly promote the formation of pores. 91,92 In addition, the microwave heating source is not in direct contact with the carbon precursor, which is safer. It is worth mentioning that the one-step process, which achieves carbonization and activation simultaneously in one reactor, is a simpler and more efficient method for preparing biomassderived carbon.…”

Sustainable and recoverable waste-based magnetic nanocomposites used for the removal of pharmaceuticals from wastewater

“…Two powdered AC were produced from PS: AC-CP was prepared by conventional pyrolysis and AC-MW was prepared by MW-assisted pyrolysis. The raw material and experimental setups used to produce AC-CP and AC-MW were the optimized procedures used by Jaria et al (2019) (to produce the material named as AC3) [34] and by (to produce the material named as MW800-20-1:5) [17],…”

“…The AC-CP was obtained from carbonization by conventional heating in a muffle furnace (Nüve, series MF 106) at 800 ºC for 150 min (heating rate of 10 °C min -1 ) and using porcelain crucibles [34]. For AC-MW, MW radiation was applied in an industrial MW furnace (Phoenix ™ AirWave CEM, dimensions 46.15 × 65.40 × 49.78 cm (w x d x h)) at 800 °C during 20 min (heating rate of 15 °C min -1 ) and using quartz crucibles [17]. After carbonization, the resulting materials were first washed with 1.0 M HCl (for ashes removal) and then with distilled water (until neutral pH of the leachate was achieved) followed by overnight drying at 100 ºC.…”

“…The utilization of waste-based AC produced by environmentally and energetically sustainable processes is a possible solution to overcome high AC prices. Recent studies have shown that microwave (MW) pyrolysis represents a viable and favourable alternative to conventional pyrolysis [11][12][13], allowing for the production of adsorbent materials equally efficient towards the removal of pharmaceuticals from water [14][15][16][17]. MW irradiation ensures an uniform, fast and selective heating, which leads to short synthesis cycles, high production yields and excellent energy efficiency, and thus, it represents an environmentally friendly technology [12,18,19].…”

“…Aiming at the assessment of the viability of using waste-based MAC for the sustainable removal of pharmaceuticals from wastewater, this study focused on: (i) the comparison, for the very first time, of the effects of different thermal treatments in the production of sustainable waste-based magnet-responsive iron oxide-functionalized powdered AC; and (ii) the evaluation of their after-use regeneration by MW and subsequent reutilization. An industrial waste from paper industry was used as alternative raw material to non-renewable carbon sources to produce two different waste-based AC, following the optimized procedure reported by Jaria et al (2019) using conventional pyrolysis (CP) [34] and that proposed by Sousa et al (2021) using MW heating [17]. The resulting materials were then loaded with magnetic iron oxide nanoparticles to obtain MAC-CP and MAC-MW, respectively.…”