Biopolymer electrospun nanofibres for the adsorption of pharmaceuticals from water systems

The focus of this study was on developing a method for the effective removal of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (ketoprofen, fenoprofen, diclofenac and ibuprofen) and carbamazepine from wastewater using nanofibres from Moringa seeds protein/PVA blend. Parameters that could affect the removal of selected pharmaceuticals such as adsorbent dosage, pH, initial concentration, temperature and contact time were optimised. The optimized method was applied to real wastewater samples collected from a wastewater treatment plant. Under optimum conditions, the percentage removal was found to range from 84.5 to 97.4% for standard mixture solution and from 70.5% to 92.5 and 77.8. to 96.1% for the real wastewater (i.e. influent and effluent respectively). The adsorption data was well fitted in the Freundlich isotherm than Langmuir isotherm for all the groups of pharmaceuticals studied. The maximum adsorption capacity obtained ranged from 31.25 to 333.33 mg g(-1). The interaction between the drugs and the nanofibres predominantly occurred by chemisorption rather than by physisorption. The results obtained demonstrated that nanofibres fabricated from biomaterials could perform better than previously published materials.