TiO2-impregnated activated carbon for removal of arsenic from water polluted by diphenylchloroarsine

TiO2-impregnated activated carbon was designed to adsorb and remove arsenic from water polluted by diphenylchloroarsine. The material showed an excellent efficiency to treat the contaminated water with diphenylchloroarsine perhaps because TiO2 and activated carbon have a collaborative removal of arsenic to adsorb diphenylchloroarsine and its hydrolysis product. In our study, several important factors on arsenic removal efficiency were evaluated including the adsorption time, initial concentration of arsenic, temperature and pH. The TiO2-impregnated activated carbon can achieve a good performance when it treats DA-contaminated water with the arsenic concentrations below 10 mg/mL in 1 h at pH of 7 and at the temperature ranging from 10 to 40 degrees C. A combination of FTIR, Brunauer-Emmett-Teller and energy-dispersive spectroscopy analyses further enables identification of the arsenic on the surfaces of TiO2-impregnated activated carbon. Therefore, the TiO2-impregnated activated carbon holds a promising prospect to deal with the polluted water caused by DA, one of chemical weapons abandoned by Japanese in China.