Photocatalytic Degradation Of Methyl Orange From Aqueous Solution By Using Chitosan Silica Composite

Abstract

In this paper, Chitosan Silica Composite (CSC) was prepared successfully. It was effectively used as a photocatalyst in the degradation process of Methyl Orange from the aqueous medium under sunlight irradiation. The photocatalytic degradation studies were carried out by varying contact time, pH, CSC dosage, and concentration of Methyl Orange. The maximum degradation percentage of Methyl Orange onto CSC was 94.01%, indicates that it has good degradation ability towards anionic dyes. The results revealed that Methyl Orange degradation was very high in an acidic medium (pH 4) at 70 minutes, and the optimum CSC dosage (0.1g). The initial dye concentration of Methyl Orange was fixed as 10ppm. The experimental data were interpreted using adsorption isotherm models like Freundlich, Langmuir, and kinetic models such as Pseudo first order and second order. The results revealed that Methyl Orange's adsorption onto CSC obeys Langmuir Isotherm model shows monolayer adsorption on the composite surface, and it follows Pseudo second order kinetics. Qm(maximum adsorption capacity) for the adsorption of Methyl Orange onto CSC was 12.19 mg/g.