Nanocomposite based molecular sieve, a green, highly efficient andrecyclable catalyst for the reduction of medicine

Water pollution has led to various diseases that have resulted in severe health issues andincreased mortality of humans and aquatic life [۱]. Therefore, to solve the problems thatemanated from wastewater contamination, pharmaceutical industries came up with differentclasses of drugs that could improve the deteriorating health conditions of the affected population.Meanwhile, the untreated discharge of effluents from pharmaceutical industries, hospitals, andsewers, has increased the contamination of surface and groundwater [۲, ۳].Different materialshave been used for treatment of pharmaceutical drugs in wastewater. We used highly orderedmesoporous molecular sieves AlMCM-۴۱ and its new nanocomposite with mixed metalnanooxideto remove and degradation of this pollution.The nanocomposite was charachterized byFourier transform infrared (FT-IR) spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electronmicroscopy (SEM), energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX), and N۲ adsorption desorptionanalyses were used to examine the structure, morphology, size and phase composition of thesynthesized nanocomposites. The results show the successful deposition of metal oxidesnanoparticles onto the framework of AlMCM-۴۱. AlMCM-۴۱ provides enormous benefits suchas environmentally safe, economic viability and porosity when used as support for metal oxidenanoparticles. The excellent catalytic activities of nanocomposites were investigated for thereduction of metronidazole and tetracycline in water at ambient temperature.The best observedperformance of reduction of these contaminants with ۱۰۰% conversion occurred within ۶ min.The nanocomposite could be recycled and reused up to five times without noticeable change inits structure and activity.

Keywords:

Nanocomposite , Mesoporous Compound , Metronidazole , Tetracycline