Characterization of Date Seed Powder Derived Porous Graphene Oxide and Its Application as an Environmental Functional Material to Remove Dye from Aqueous Solutions

Abstract

This study aims to prepare graphene oxide (GO) from raw date seeds (RDSs), considered one of the available agricultural wastes in Saudi Arabia. The preparation method is done by the conversion of date seeds to lignin and then to graphite which is used in a modified Hummer’s method to obtain GO. The adsorption of insoluble phenothiazine-derived dye (PTZS) over raw date Seeds (RDSs) as a low-cost adsorbent was investigated in this study. X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) were used to characterize (RDSs). According to the calculations, Freundlich isotherms and pseudo-second-order accurately predicted the kinetic rate of adsorption. The adsorption ability was 4.889 mg/g, and the removal rate was 93.98% GO-date Seeds mass, 11 mg/L starting dye concentration, at a temperature of 328 K, pH 9, and contact length of 30 min by boosting the PTZS solution’s ionic strength. In addition, the computed free energies revealed that the adsorption process was physical. Thermodynamic calculations revealed that dye adsorption onto GO-date seeds was exothermic and spontaneous.