Synthesis of hollow mesoporous silica spheres functionalized with copper ferrocyanide and its application for Cs+ removal

In this study, the potassium copper ferrocyanide-functionalized hollow mesoporous silica spheres was successfully prepared. SEM, FTIR, XRD, EDS, and XPS techniques were used to characterize the structure of materials before and after functionalization. The synthesized functionalized hollow mesoprous silica was applied to remove cesium from aqueous solution. The applicability of the adsorbent for the removal of cesium ions was assessed and the effective parameters such as solution pH, contacting time, initial Cs+ concentration, and competitive ions effect were evaluated systematically under the batch mode. The experimental results showed that the adsorbent exhibited high Cs+ selectivity even in the highly concentrated coexisting ions solution, which makes them to be used as potential adsorbents for the removal of cesium from nuclear wastewater or contaminated groundwater.