The Characterization and Amoxicillin Adsorption Activity of Mesopore CaCO₃ Microparticles Prepared Using Rape Flower Pollen

Abstract

A precipitation reaction method was employed to prepare mesopore calcium carbonate (CaCO3) using rape flower pollen as the template. CaCO3 adsorbent was characterized using X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electronic microscopy (SEM), and Brunner−Emmet−Teller measurements (BET). The equilibrium adsorption data on amoxicillin were explained using Langmuir, Freundlich, and Temkin adsorption isotherm models. The pseudo-first order, second order, pseudo-second order, and intra-particle diffusion kinetic models were used to explore adsorption kinetics. Equilibrium adsorption of as-prepared CaCO3 was better depicted using the Langmuir adsorption model with an R2 of 0.9948. The separation factor (RL) was found to be in the range of 0 < RL < 1, indicating the favorable adsorption of amoxicillin. The adsorption capacity of mesopore CaCO3 reached 13.49 mg·g−1 in 0.2 g∙L−1 amoxicillin solution. The values of adsorption thermodynamic parameters (ΔHθ, ΔSθ, ΔGθ) were obtained. In addition, the adsorption process turned out to be endothermic and spontaneous for the CaCO3 product at 298 K, 308 K, and 318 K.

Keywords

• calcium carbonate
• mesopore
• amoxicillin
• adsorption
• kinetics
• thermodynamics