Asian Journal of Biochemical and Pharmaceutical Research Issue 2 (Vol.

1) 2011 ISSN: 2231-2560

Research Article

Asian Journal of Biochemical and Pharmaceutical Research

Potential of Nanotechnology For The Treatment of Waste Water

J. Pandey*, R. Khare, M. Kamboj, S. Khare and R. Singh

Amity University, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow Campus, Viraj Khand -5, Gomti Nagar, Lucknow, 226010,

Received: 28 March 2011; Revised: 16 April 2011; Accepted: 22 April. 2011

Abstract: With the rising rate of population, need for clean water and subsequent increase in generation
of wastewater, it has become mandatory to treat wastewater in order to obtain high-quality pure water.
The primary need for wastewater treatment is because less than 1 percent of the worlds water is
suitable for drinking while the remaining is brackish. Nanotechnology could help to solve the problem as it
is generally used in areas where there is a need for attacking at the molecular level of the
substances. The highly active, magnetically re-extractable nanoscale Pd on magnetite catalyst
(Pd/Fe3O4) , novel Titanium dioxide nanocatalyst and nanofilteration membrane are some of the
technologies which have been developed for application in wastewater treatment processes have shown
promise of water purification. This review article aims to provide an insight into the treatment techniques
prevalent for industrial wastewater purification by nanotechnology, which could make heavily polluted
water fit for drinking, sanitation, and irrigation. They can chemically degrade pollutants instead of
simply moving them somewhere else, including pollutants for which existing technologies are
inefficient or prohibitively expensive.

Keywords: Nanocatalysts, Nanofilteration membrane, Wastewater purification,

INTRODUCTION:

Water is a scarce resource, and for many countries particularly India, supplies already
fall short of demand. With the pressures of climate change and population growth in the urban
areas, water has become even scarcer. Moreover, in these regions, the water available is often
unsafe to drink. As a result, there is a growing need for fresh and clean water especially for
drinking purposes. This escalates the need for technologies that produce high quality water after
treatment that do not cause any detrimental effect to human beings or the environment.

The principal way nanotechnologies might help alleviate water problems is by solving
the technical challenges by removing water contaminants, including pathogenic bacteria, viruses,
harmful chemicals arsenic, mercury, pesticides, insecticides and salt pose etc., altogether, instead of
dumping from one resource to another, as environmental issues have global impact, destroying every
component of atmosphere at an alarming rate(Han Sheng H.,2001).

The presence in the environment of large quantities of toxic metals such as mercury, lead,
cadmium, zinc or others, poses serious health risks to humans, and this threat puts the scientific

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community under pressure to develop new methods to detect and eliminate toxic contaminants from
wastewaters in efficient and economically viable ways(Tsang Lee,2009). Utilizing nanotechnology
for wastewater treatment would certainly help the human being, our environment as well as
industry too as it has shown amazing results in every fields.

NANOCATALYSTS:A nanocatalyst is a substance or materials with the catalytic properties

that has at least one nanoscale dimension either externally or in terms of internal structures.
Generally the catalyst that are able to function at atomic scale are nanocatalysts. They owe
their better catalytic properties to their porous nanostructure that provides high surface to volume
ratio hence increase the catalytic activity(K.Mackenzie,2006) .Melting point of nanoscale metal
may lower from the original metal species at the macroscopic level as platinum has melting
point which is around 2000K but the nano catalyst made up of Pt has melting point around
1000K.(Fig:1)

Fig:1 Methods of waste water treatment using nanocatalyst:

There are various methods for wastewater treatment using nanocatalyst. Some of the
eco-friendly and less expensive methods are:

Novel Titanium dioxide nanocatalysts for wastewater purification:Titanium dioxide is used

as catalyst in wastewater treatment by photocatalysis(Qian Chao-Yong,2000). During
photocatalysis, the illumination of the titanium dioxide results in water and oxygen from the air
being converted into reactive hydroxyl radical which breakdown organic pollutants resistant to
biological degradation in the water.

Nano-Titanium dioxide photocatalytic oxidation technology can help in the complete

degradation of organic pollutants in water by using solar energy(D.Y.Goswami,1997).It has a
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prominent advantage, especially when high concentrations of organic pollutants in water is their
or by other means difficult to handle. It has the more obvious advantages, unmatched by other
conventional methods, especially in recent years, with the development of highly efficient
photocatalyst, loads and metal-doped nano-particles, optoelectronics, with catalytic methods and
solar technology research and development, so that nano-Titanium dioxide photocatalytic
oxidation used in water treatment can be used as a good promise in the future(Mei Shang,2000).

Growing Interest: The chart below represents the number of the publish reports on
nanostructured metal catalyst .(Fig:2 & 3)

Fig:2 Number of publications showing growth interest in nanoparticles

Fig:3 Specific metal catalyst: Interest in specific elements in the preparation of Nanoparticles in the
period 2000-2007

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Fig : 4 Palladium Nanoparticles For Water Purification

Palladium catalysts can be used for the selective removal of halogenated organic compounds
from aqueous waste via hydro de halogenation reactions in the presence of other omnipresent
constituents of industrial wastewaters(Yuan G.,2003). This detoxification of the water can prevent
the need for further cost-intensive treatment or discharge into waste incineration plants. Often,
the water can then be released to municipal sewage plants. The catalyst can tolerate various
inorganic and organic substances in relevant concentrations. Wastewaters containing a high
background concentration of organic solvents can also be cleaned from halogenated
pollutants(Kopinke F-D.,2003). However, waters which contain heavy metals such as lead or
mercury or reduced sulphur species such as sulphides need specific pre-treatments prior to Pd-
catalysed hydro de halogenations.(Fig : 4 )

Fig:5 Selective destruction ofthe Heavy Organic Compounds(HOCs) by hydrodehalogenation (HDH)

reactions on palladium-containing nano-catalysts.

Detoxification means that persistent HOCs are converted into organic compounds which can
easily be removed by biodegradation in a wastewater treatment plant(Kopinke F-D.,2004). A novel
promising trend in environmental research is the application of nano-reagents (such as zero-valent
iron) and nano-catalysts. As known from nano-sized metal particles, nano catalysts have the advantage
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of very high reaction rates due to high specific surface areas and low mass-transfer restrictions(Lowry
G.V.,2000). For special applications in wastewater treatment the researchers generated extremely
active palladium catalysts on the basis of ferromagnetic carrier colloids. The magnetic nano-sized
carriers (such as zero-valent iron or magnetite) were spiked with traces of Pd (0.1 wt.-%). These nano-
catalysts have been successfully tested in different reactor systems at the laboratory scale. Using Pd on
nano-scale supports leads to enormous activity of the catalyst which is several orders of magnitude
higher than reached in conventional fixed-bed reactors. The ferromagnetism of the carriers enables a
separation of the catalysts from the treated water by means of magneto-separation(Liu Y., 2005). This
gives the chance to reuse the catalyst several times. The preferred reduction for the HDH reaction is
molecular hydrogen. For highly contaminated waters, alternative hydrogen donors such as formic acid
have been successfully tested.(Fig: 5)

NANOSTRUCTURED SILICA:
New nanotechnology wastewater treatment system for removing heavy metals :

A new type of nanomaterial called nanostructured silica has been found to fulfil the requisites
necessary for removing heavy metals for these applications(Yang,P.,2001 ).

With its large surface area and regular pores, it is an ideal material that after a functionalization
process that links to its surface diverse organic ligands has the capability of being able to extract heavy
metals from wastewaters. This capacity also allows its use as a high sensitivity detection tool for these
toxic metals, and considering that the contamination levels permitted in drinking water are
increasingly restrictive; functionalized silica offers additional benefits over other water treatment
methods.

The design of this nanostructured functionalized silica is based on the emulation on the
material of the reaction that heavy metals have with some biomolecules in living cells(A. Lide, 2001)
Therefore a good understanding of the reaction that bonds such metals to particular functional groups
on living cells is of great use to determine the best functional groups to be used on the surface of the
nanostructured material; for example, it has been detected that heavy metals interact mainly with
functional groups containing oxygen, nitrogen and sulphur.

Silica such as MCM-41 and HMS Modified with 5-mercapto-1-methylthiazole capable of

collecting lead and zinc.

Following the same line of thinking, the researchers from the URJC, managed by Doctor Isabel Sierra,
have achieved a great improvement in heavy metal absorption by creating new materials using
different types of silica such as MCM-41 and HMS and modified them with 5-mercapto-1-
methylthiazole making them capable of collecting lead and zinc(Mc-Nab W.W.,2000). Their study has
also demonstrated that the prepared materials are capable of several cycles of absorption/desorption.
With the added benefit that the retained materials can be recovered and then reused, and this has
important economical benefits for industry and society.

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Advantages: It is unexpensive in wastewater treatment in comparison to other traditional catalyst

means it is economically viable. It is also eco-friendly if compared with simple catalyst. The
water purifying capacity is much better using nanocatalyst because it has the large surface to
react with the reactants as nanocatalyst is very small in size so it has a very high surface to
volume ratio. Nanocatalyst even helps in removing protozoan cysts, oocysts, and helminth ova
and in some cases bacteria and viruses from the water. Nanocatalyst also provides more
effective alternatives to the treatment of contaminants such as mercury, arsenic, and
perchlorate. These all are not possible by using simple catalyst. The quality of water that is
obtained after using nanocatalyst in water purifing system is well and it is reused by several
industry, for irrigation, etc. It has been determined that these nanocatalyst based purification
are able to achieve 99.95 percent efficiency, when compared to conventional technologies. As
a result, the water or effluent that is obtained after the treatment could be reused for various
domestic and industrial applications. Replacement of precious metal catalysts by catalysts
tailored at the nanoscale and use of base metals, thus improving chemical reactivity and
reducing process costs. A new nanotech catalyst offers industry an opportunity to reduce the use
of expensive and toxic heavy metals.

Disadvantages: Any assessment of future markets for nanotechnology-based water treatments

must take account of both the risks and opportunities. There is health and environmental risks
of using nanocatalyst for water treatment. For example, there are concerns that the enhanced
reactivity of nanoparticles makes them more toxic. Their small size also means they could be
hard to contain, so could more easily escape into the environment and potentially damage
aquatic life(Xia QIN Hai ,2001).

MEMBRANE FILTERATION TECHNOLOGY:

Nanofiltration is a liquid separation membrane technology positioned between reverse

osmosis ( RO ) and ultrafiltration. While RO can remove the smallest of solute molecules, in
the range of 0.0001 micron in diameter and smaller, nanofiltration (NF) removes molecules in
the 0.001 micron range. It refers to a membrane process that rejects solutes approximately 1
nanometer (10 angstroms) in size with molecular weights above 200. Because they feature pore
sizes larger than RO membranes, NF membranes remove organic compounds and selected salts
at lower pressures than RO systems. It is also capable of removing bacteria and viruses as
well as organic-related color without generating undesirable chlorinated hydrocarbons and
trihalomethanes (THMs)(Song Y.,1999).

Nanofiltration is used to remove pesticides and other organic contaminants from surface
and ground waters to help insure the safety of public drinking water supplies. Sometimes
referred to as "membrane softening," NF is an attractive alternative to lime softening or zeolite
softening technologies and since NF operates on lower pressure than RO, energy costs are
lower than for a comparable RO treatment system(Jin-Bao,2000). As such, nanofiltration is
suited especially to treatment of well water or water from surface supplies such as rivers or
lakes.

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Nanofiltration membranes: Nanofiltration membranes are already widely applied to remove

dissolved salts and micro-pollutants, soften water and treat wastewater. The membranes act as a
physical barrier, capturing particles and micro-organisms bigger than their pores, and selectively
rejecting substances. Nanotechnology is expected to further improve membrane technology and also
drive down the prohibitively high costs of desalination getting fresh water from salty
water(Jinsheng G.,1999).

Attapulgite clays: Naturally occurring attapulgite clays and zeolites are also used in nanofilters. These
are locally available in many places around the world and have innate nanometer-size pores. A study
using attapulgite clay membranes to filter wastewater from a milk factory in Algeria has shown they
can economically and effectively reduce whey and other organic matter in wastewater, making it safe
to drink.

Nanofiltration membranes can produce safe drinking water from brackish groundwater:
Researchers are developing new classes of nanoporous materials that are more effective than
conventional filters. For example, a study in South Africa has shown than nanofiltration membranes
can produce safe drinking water from brackish groundwater.

Carbon Nanotube Filters Remove Bacteria And Viruses: A team of Indian and US scientists have
developed carbon nanotube filters that remove bacteria and viruses more effectively than conventional
membrane filters(Kiso Y.,2000).

Properties of nanofiltration: The nanofiltration membranes pore size is equivalent to a molecular

weight cut off value of approximately 300-500 g/mole. Hence the components possessing this
molecular weight can be easily separated from the components possessing higher molecular weight.
The surface of the NF membranes is slightly charged. Charge interaction plays major role because the
dimensions of the pores are less than one order of magnitude larger than the size of ions. This property
also helps in separating ions of different valencies.

Properties of nanofiltration: The nanofiltration membranes pore size is equivalent to a molecular

weight cut off value of approximately 300-500 g/mole. Hence the components possessing this
molecular weight can be easily separated from the components possessing higher molecular weight.
The surface of the NF membranes is slightly charged(Lan W.,1999). Charge interaction plays major
role because the dimensions of the pores are less than one order of magnitude larger than the size of
ions. This property also helps in separating ions of different valencies.

Mass transfer can be graphically represented as follows:

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Where:
P = External pressure
(J) = Solvent flux
(R) = Rejection
solvent flux is given by:

P = Effective transmembrane pressure [N/m2]

n = The permeate viscosity
Rtot = The total resistance towards solvent flow [m-1].

For solute behavior characterization, the rejection is given by:

Cb = Concentration level l

= Final concentration of solute in the permeate.

Hydrotalcite: Zeolites can also be fabricated. They can be used to separate harmful organics from
water and to remove heavy metal ions. Researchers at Australia's Commonwealth Scientific and
Research Organization have created a low-cost synthetic clay, hydrotalcite, that attracts arsenic,
removing it from water. They have suggested a novel packaging for this product for low-income
communities a 'teabag' that can be dipped into household water supplies for about 15 minutes
before drinking. And selling the used teabags back to the authorities might increase recycling and help
with waste disposal of concentrated arsenic.

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Nano magnets: Magnetic nanoparticles are other examples of how nanotechnology could make
heavily polluted water fit for drinking, sanitation and irrigation. Researchers at the Indian Institute of
Science, in Bangalore, have used nano titanium dioxide for this very purpose.

Magnetic nanoparticles have large surface areas relative to their volume and can easily bind
with chemicals. In water treatment applications, they can be used to bind with contaminants such as
arsenic or oil and then be removed using a magnet. Several companies are commercialising such
technologies and researchers are frequently publishing new discoveries in this area.For example,
scientists at Rice University in the United States are using magnetic "nanorust" to remove arsenic from
drinking water. Nanorust's large surface area means it can capture one hundred times more arsenic
than larger counterparts. The team projects that 200500 milligrams of nanorust could treat a litre of
water. And it is developing a way of creating nanorust from inexpensive household items. This could
significantly reduce production costs, making it a viable product for communities throughout the
developing world.

Detection of Water-Borne Contaminants: Nanotechnology can also detect water-borne

contaminants. Researchers are developing new sensor technologies that combine micro and
nanofabrication to create small, portable and highly accurate sensors that can detect single cells of
chemical and biochemical substances in water. Several research consortia are field testing such devices
and some expect to commercialise these soon. For example, a team at Pennsylvania State University in
the United States has developed a way of detecting arsenic in water by using nanowires on a silicon
chip.

CONCLUSION:

Nanotechnologies offer an affordable, effective, efficient and durable ways of achieving the
target of water purification- specifically because using nanoparticles for water treatment will allow
manufacturing that is less polluting than traditional methods and requires less labour, capital, land and
energy.A range of water treatment devices that incorporate nanotechnology are already on the market,
with others either close to market launch or in the process of being developed.

Some location of Lucknow have higly polluted water and is not suitable for drinking purpose
and the quality of water that is obtained after the adoption of nanotechnology is well and purified at
extreme level. It has been determined that these nano-based filters are able to achieve 99.95 percent
efficiency, when compared to conventional technologies. As a result, the water or effluent that is
obtained after the treatment could be reused for various domestic and industrial applications

Nanotechnology is an emerging discipline, its application in water treatment has just begun, but
the emerging trends. It can be predicted, with the deepening of research work and practical to a higher
level, nanotechnology water treatment technology will be developed in the 21st century, and solve
global water shortages and water pollution problems play an important role.

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*Correspondence Author: J. Pandey, Amity University, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow Campus, Viraj
Khand -5, Gomti Nagar, Lucknow, 226010,

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