Development of engineered natural organic sorbents for environmental applications. 1. Materials, approaches, and characterizations

A technology for effecting diagenesis-like transformations in young natural organic matter (NOM) derived from common plant materials is described. Thirteen such materials were processed in liquid-phase water at superheated temperature/pressure conditions. In all cases significant changes in the physical and chemical properties of the raw NOM source materials occurred. Their carbon and nitrogen contents increased, their hydrogen and oxygen contents decreased, their surface areas initially increased dramatically, then sharply decreased, and their bulk densities and equilibrated aqueous phase pH values increased as functions of increasing temperature and pressure. Spectroscopic analyses confirmed marked changes in the molecular structures of the NOMs resulting from superheated water processing; e.g., fractions of alkyl and aromatic carbons increased while oxygen-associated functional organic carbon decreased. These changes in elemental composition and molecular structure indicate that the organic fractions of the raw materials became less polar, increasingly condensed, and more aromatic as a result of the reactions induced by superheated water processing, the changes correlating directly with the temperature/pressure conditions employed. The results presented confirm that the long-term biogeochemical processes that in nature effect geologically slow advances in the chemical states of organic carbon can be simulated and markedly accelerated by superheated water processing.