Simultaneous Elimination of Dyes and Antibiotic with a Hydrothermally Generated NiAlTi Layered Double Hydroxide Adsorbent

In this study, a hydrothermal route was used to design a novel NiAlTi layered double hydroxide. The material so-obtained was characterized using various physiochemical techniques such as X-ray diffraction, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, thermogravimetric analysis for structural analysis, scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscopy for morphological analysis, and so on. The material so-obtained was further applied for wastewater remediation and was found to be an efficient, cost-effective, and reusable adsorbent. Organic contaminants such as dyes and antibiotics were used as pollutants to carry out the removal study. NiAlTi LDH was found to be an excellent adsorbent for the removal of anionic dyes and antibiotics. Excellent performance was shown by NiAlTi LDH at a broad pH range from 4 to 10 for anionic dyes (orange II and methyl orange), but tetracycline removal was predominantly maximum at pH = 9. Further, the kinetic studies also revealed that the adsorption process of both organic contaminants obeyed a pseudo-second-order model. In addition, the Langmuir isotherm adsorption model fitted the experimental results for both types of pollutants very well. The attained maximum adsorption capacity was superb for both organic dyes and antibiotics (1250 mg/g for MO, 2000 mg/g for OH and 238.09 mg/g for TC). NiAlTi LDH was also capable of simultaneous elimination from a mixture of antibiotics and dyes. Further, NiAlTi LDH also showed outstanding stability and reusability, making it one of the most promising materials for large-scale wastewater remediation contaminated by dyes and antibiotics.