Synthesis and characterization of various metal ferrite nanocomposites (M(Mn,Co,Cu)Fe2O4@AK) of activated carbon prepared from the pulp of industrially processed black cumin (nigella sativa) and investigation of their adsorptive performance in removing some impurities from water

Due to its high surface area, porous structure and special surface reactivity, activated carbon is well used in a variety of areas such as adsorbents in air and water pollution control, catalysts in the chemical and petrochemical industries, and purifiers in the food and pharmaceutical industries. In addition, activated carbon can quickly adsorb organic and inorganic pollutants from water. However, due to the high cost of activated carbon, the efforts to produce cheaper activated carbon, especially from plant-based domestic and industrial wastes, have gained accelerate recently. But filtration, the traditional method for separating activated carbon, may cause the blockage of filters or the loss of carbon. Moreover, activated carbon has been discarded with the process sludge after use in water treatment, resulting in the secondary pollution. In recent years, to overcome the disadvantages of activated carbon, great attention has been paid to the production of magnetic activated carbon followed by the application of magnetic separation technology, which is considered a fast and effective technique for the separation of magnetic particles. In this thesis, activated carbon and its various magnetic metal ferrite nanocomposites (M(Mn, Co, Cu)Fe2O4-ÇAK) prepared by K2CO3 activation from industrially processed black cumin pulp were synthesized for the first time. The synthesized adsorbents were characterized by physicochemical analyses such as proximate, aproximate, nitrogen gas adsorption-desorption, SEM-EDX, XRD, VSM, Raman, FTIR, Boehm titration, pHpzc, and yield. In addition, to test their usability in environmental studies, their adsorption performance in removing some pollutants such as MM dye, Pb(II) heavy metal, and OTS antibiotic, which are frequently found in industrial wastewater, was investigated and kinetic and isotherm modeling was performed. Furthermore, desorption studies were conducted to recover pollutant chemicals and/or determine the efficiency of reusing the waste adsorbent.