A novel alginate/PVA hydrogel -supported Fe3O4 particles for efficient heterogeneous Fenton degradation of organic dyes

A major deficiency of the traditional Fenton technology in practical application is the production of a large amount of sludge. In this paper, we first synthesized a kind of magnetic alginate/PVA hydrogel microspheres by inverse emulsion method along with coprecipitation method. Through the cross-linking action of iron ions, sodium alginate and polyvinyl alcohol formed a stable interpenetrating network structure, in which the magnetic Fe3O4 nanoparticles were stably wrapped. After drying, a novel alginate/PVA hydrogel-supported magnetic Fe3O4 particles were obtained. FTIR,XRD , SEM and EDS were used to confirm the composition and structure of the composite material. Furthermore, the resultant alginate/PVA hydrogel-supported Fe3O4 particles perform excellent broad-spectrum catalytic activity for Fenton degradation of organic dyes. Especially, compared with the classical Fenton catalyst, the double-crosslinked structure in the alginate/PVA hydrogel endows the magnetic Fe3O4 particles with high stability and recyclability. After reuse for six times, the mass loss of the composite material is only 10 %, which can avoid the generation of iron sludge in Fenton-like reaction to the greatest extent.