Search

Chlorination is a versatile technique to combat water-borne pathogens. Over the last years, there has been continued research interest to abate the formation of chlorinated disinfection by-products (DBPs). To prevent hazardous DBPs in drinking water, it is decided to diminish organic precursors, among which humic acids (HA) resulting from the decomposition and transformation of biomass. Metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) such as zeolitic imidazolate frameworks (ZIFs) have recently received tremendous attention in water purification. Herein, customized ZIF-67 MOFs possessing various physicochemical properties were prepared by changing the cobalt source. The HA removal by ZIF-67-Cl, ZIF-67-OAc, ZIF-67-NO3, and ZIF-67-SO4 were 85.6%, 68.9%, 86.1%, and 87.4%, respectively, evidently affected by the specific surface area. HA uptake by ZIF-67-SO4 indicated a removal efficiency beyond 90% in 4 90% after 60 min mixing the solution with 0.3 g L−1 ZIF-67-SO4. Notably, an acceptable removal performance (∼72.3%) was obtained even at HA concentrations up to 100 mg L−1. The equilibrium data fitted well with the isotherm models in the order of Langmuir> Hill > BET> Khan > Redlich-Peterson> Jovanovic> Freundlich > and Temkin. The maximum adsorption capacity qm for HA uptake by ZIF-67-SO4 was 175.89 mg g−1, well above the majority of adsorbents. The pseudo-first-order model described the rate of HA adsorption by time. In conclusion, ZIF-67-SO4 presented promising adsorptive properties against HA. Further studies would be needed to minimize cobalt leaching from the ZIF-67-SO4 structure and improve its reusability safely, to ensure its effectiveness and the economy of adsorption system.

Abstract Photocatalytic degradation under ultra-low powered light is a viable advanced oxidation process technique against extensive emerging contaminants. As a new and remarkable class of nanoporous materials, metal-organic frameworks (MOFs), attract interest for the supreme adsorptive and photocatalytic functionalities. An outstanding MOF, MIL-101(Fe) chosen as a photocatalyst template for the synthesis of α-Fe2O3 by a simple thermal modification to improve the structural properties toward methylene blue (MB) eradication. Octahedron-like α-Fe2O3 photocatalyst (Modified MIL-101(Fe), M-MIL-101(Fe)) was superior in dispersion and separation properties in aqueous medium. Moreover, the adsorptive and catalytic performance was increased for modified form by ~ 7.3% and ~ 17.1% compared to pristine MIL-101(Fe), respectively. Synergistic improvement of MB removal achieved by simultaneous adsorption/degradation under 5-W LED irradiation. Parametric study indicated an 18.1% and 44.5% improvement in MB removal was observed by increasing pH from 4 to 10, and M-MIL-101(Fe) dose from 0.2 to 1 g L−1, respectively. MB removal followed the pseudo-second-order kinetics model and the process efficiency dropped by 38% as MB concentration increased from 5 to 20 mg L−1. Radical trapping tests revealed the significant role of $${\mathrm{OH}}^{.}$$ OH . and electron radicals as the major participants in dye degradation. A significant loss in the efficiency of M-MIL-101(Fe) was observed in the reusability tests that is good to study further. In conclusion, a simple thermal post-synthesis modification on MIL-101(Fe) improved its structural, catalytic, and adsorptive properties against MB.

Introduction and purpose: Today, with the developments of technology, the use of mobile phones has become an inevitable principle in human life, and in this field, mobile base transceiver stations (BTS) have been developed as one of the necessary infrastructures. The assessment of electromagnetic waves produced by these stations assumes critical importance in management planning for deploying these systems and maintaining environmental standards. The present study aimed to measure the ambient waves emitted by BTS towers of Irancell and Hamrah-e-Aval operators in Boroujerd in Lorestan province and compare it with available standards. Methods: This is a descriptive-analytical study. In this research, the measurements were performed using an electromagnetic field meter (Spectran HF-4060) at the distances of 0, 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 50, 100, 150, and 200 meters from each antenna at the same weather and time conditions. The obtained data (magnetic fields and power density) were analyzed with Mann-Whitney statistical test and compared with available standards. Results: This research found that in both Irancell and Hamrah-e-Aval operators, the power densities calculated at specified distances were much lower than the standard limits. The comparison of disease complications based on the GHQ questionnaire in the residents around Irancell antennas and the first satellite demonstrated that in both antennas, the highest percentage of disease complications were mild or least, moderate and none, respectively, and there were no severe disease complications. Conclusion: As evidenced by the results of this study, the level of electromagnetic waves in the studied areas in both Irancell and Hamrah Aval antennas was lower compared to the existing standards.

Abstract Valorization of waste materials and byproducts as adsorbents is a sustainable approach for water treatment systems. Pottery Granules (PG) without any chemical and thermal modification were used as a low-cost, abundant, and environmentally benign adsorbent against Pb(II), the toxic metal in drinking water. The porous structure and complex mineral composition of PG made it an efficient adsorbent material for Pb(II). The effect of key physicochemical factors was investigated to determine the significance of contact time, PG dose, pH, solution temperature, and coexisting ions, on the process. Pb(II) removal increased by PG dose in the range of 5–15 g/L, and agitation time from 5 to 60 min. Increasing Pb(II) concentration led to a drop in Pb(II) removal, however, adsorption capacity increased significantly as concentration elevated. Pb(II) removal also increased significantly from ~ 45% to ~ 97% by pH from 2 to 12. A ~ 20% improvement in Pb(II) adsorption after rising the solution temperature by 30˚C, indicated the endothermic nature of the process. The sorption was described to be a favorable process in which Pb(II) was adsorbed in a multilayer onto the heterogeneous PG surface. The qmax of 9.47 mg/g obtained by the Langmuir model was superior among many reported low-cost adsorbents. The Pb(II) adsorption was described well by the Pseudo- first-order kinetic model. Na+, Mg2+, Ca2+, Cd2+, and Zn2+ showed a negligible effect on Pb(II) adsorption. However, the presence of Mn2+ and Fe2+ significantly hindered the process efficacy. In conclusion, the use of waste material such as PG against Pb(II) is a viable option from the economic and effectiveness points of view.

Abstract Metronidazole is well-known antibiotic which, globally, ranks high in popular usage. Therefore, traces of residues of this antibiotic were identified in aquatic bodies. A photosynthetic cyanobacterium, of the microalgae category, S. platensis, has been found to be efficient in the removal of this antibiotic. This study was performed to evaluate the efficiency of S. platensis in the removal of metronidazole from aqueous environments. To set up the optimum conditions for facilitating metronidazole removal, BBD model was employed. The experiment included the following parameters: the initial metronidazole level (10–80 mg/L), pH (4–10), contact time (10–60 min), and biomass dose (0.1–0.5 g/L). From the findings it was evident that S. platensis was able to remove 88.15% of the metronidazole under the following conditions: contact time 38.05 min, metronidazole level 35 mg/L, pH 7.71 and a biomass dose 0.3 g/L. The quadratic model revealed that metronidazole concentration was the chief variable that influenced its removal rate. MNZ removal rate was observed to follow the pseudo-second-order model and the Freundlich model. From the thermodynamic data it appeared that the process of metronidazole biosorption was spontaneous, exothermic and physical. The results of this study revealed that S. platensis could be used as an inexpensive and efficient biosorbent to remove the metronidazole from aqueous solutions.

As an emerging class of nanoporous materials, Metal Organic Framework (MOFs) are distinguished for environmental remediation. ZIFs and Ni-MOF chosen as fluoride (F-) scavengers due to their robust structures and straightforward synthesis routes. F- adsorption was studied as a function of the ZIFs geometry and structural properties. The efficacy of MOFs for F- abatement was in the order of ZIF-67-NO3 (70.1%) > ZIF-8-Cube (64.7%) > ZIF-67-OAc (62.4%) > ZIF-8-Cuboid (59.2) > Ni-MOF (58.5%) > ZIF-8-Octahedron (57.1%) > ZIF-8-Leaf (55.3%) > ZIF-67-SO4 (55.1%) > and ZIF-67-Cl (52.3%). The key operating variables i.e. pH, mixing time, F- concentration, and ZIF-67-NO3 dose were modeled using the Box-Behnken design (BBD). The model revealed the process mainly influenced by solution pH. The model optimized the operating condition and obtained a maximum 85.9% F- removal by mixing time = 41.1 min, ZIF-67-NO3 dose = 0.9 g/L, solution pH = 4.86, and F- = 6.5 mg/L. Non-linear form of isotherm and kinetic models disclosed the multilayers F- adsorption onto ZIF-67-NO3 with an qmax =25.9 mg/g, and chemisorption as the rate-controlling step. F- sorption decreased slightly by temperature in the range of 303 to 323 K. The structure of ZIF-67-NO3 remained stable under three consecutive use-reuse cycles with an about 10% loss in removal efficiency.

Abstract Spirulina platensis is one of the types of blue-green algae that was used as a biosorbent in this study. The aim of this study was to investigate the efficiency of S. platensis in removing MG from aqueous solutions and also to evaluate the biosorbent capacity using different kinetic models and isotherms. To obtain the optimum condition for MG biosorption using BBD, input factors included the initial level of MG 20–200 mg.L−1), dose of S. platensis (0.1–1.5 g.L−1), pH (4–9), and contaact time (5–80 min). The statistical method of BBD was considered to evaluate the removal rate of MG dye from aqueous solutions. The prediction of MG removal efficiencies and the evaluation of variable interactions were performed using a polynomial equation. The maximum removal efficiency of MG was obtained as 94.12% under MG level of 100.54 mg. L−1, pH of 7.57, contact time of 52.43 min, and S. platensis dose of 0.98 g. L−1. The removal MG efficiency enhanced with the increase in pH, reaction time, and S. platensis dose, and reduced with the decrease in MG level. The quadratic model suggested that the pH had a high impact on MG removal. The isotherms and kinetics data could be properly illustrated by the Freundlich model and the pseudo-second-order equation. Thermodynamic factors, including ΔG0, ΔH0, and ΔS0 showed the adsorption of MG onto S. platensis was spontaneous and exothermic. The acquired findings also showed that the physisorption mechanism mainly govern the MG sorption process. As a result, S. platensis showed excellent adsorptive properties and hence could be offered as a viable option for eliminating MG from aqueous solutions.

Flower-like spherical 1-D-BiOI nanoparticles were solvothermally synthesized and evaluated for the photocatalytic degradation of the azo dyes Methyl Orange (MO), Methylene Blue (MB), and Eriochrome Black-T (EBT) using ultra-low-power LED light. The soft white-light bulb positively affected the photo-assisted remediation efficiency. The tests showed that 1-D-BiOI removal efficiency against 12 mg/L dyes MO, MB, and EBT were 47.4, 66.1, and 86.7%, respectively. The optimum experimental parameters were determined by modeling and optimization using RSM. Scavenging tests indicated that •OH are the main responsible species. COD was increased initially during light irradiation and then decreased by dye mineralization.

Abstract Residues obtained after wood biomass liquefaction were used as precursors for the synthesis of two activated biochars. The source of biomass liquefaction constituted of industrial wood processing by‐products, including bark and wood sawdust. The liquefied residues were analyzed in terms of chemical components and structure. Carbonization under nitrogen atmosphere followed by physical CO2 activation allowed to obtain microporous activated carbons with specific surface areas of 741 and 522 m2 g−1, and micropore volumes of 0.38 and 0.27 cm3 g−1, respectively. The obtained activated carbons were used to remove toxic hexavalent chromium from the aquatic environment. The observed sorption capacities were 80.6 mg g−1 versus 36.7 mg g−1 for wood bark‐derived and wood sawdust‐derived carbon, respectively, indicating a key role of the wood residue source in the effectiveness of Cr(VI) removal by resulting carbons. Despite the dominant microporous structure, the adsorption kinetics was surprisingly fast, especially for the bark‐derived carbon, since the adsorption equilibrium was reached within 2 h. The sorption mechanism of chromium was based on the carbon surface‐mediated reduction of toxic hexavalent form to its non‐toxic trivalent form, as confirmed by the X‐ray photoelectron analysis. Therefore, the residues from wood liquefaction can be easily converted into porous activated biocarbons capable of adsorbing significant amounts of hazardous Cr(VI) while reducing them to non‐toxic Cr(III).

Background: The ACTION IO study (NCT03584191) aimed to identify perceptions, attitudes, behaviors, and potential barriers to effective obesity care across people with obesity (PwO) and healthcare professionals (HCPs). Results from Saudi Arabia are presented here. Methods: A survey was conducted from June to September 2018. In Saudi Arabia, eligible PwO were ≥18 years with a self reported body mass index of ≥30 kg/m2. Eligible HCPs were in direct patient care. Results: The survey was completed by 1,000 PwO and 200 HCPs in Saudi Arabia. Many PwO (68%) and HCPs (62%) agreed that obesity is a chronic disease. PwO felt responsible for their weight management (67%), but 71% of HCPs acknowledged their responsibility to contribute. Overall, 58% of PwO had discussed weight with their HCP in the past 5 years, 46% had received a diagnosis of obesity, and 44% had a follow up appointment scheduled. Although 50% of PwO said they were motivated to lose weight, only 39% of HCPs thought their patients were motivated to lose weight. Less than half of PwO (39%) and HCPs (49%) regarded genetic factors as a barrier to weight loss. Many PwO had seriously attempted weight loss (92%) and achieved ≥5% weight loss (61%), but few maintained their weight loss for >1 year (5%). Conclusion: Saudi Arabian results have revealed misperceptions among PwO and HCPs about obesity, highlighting opportunities for further education and training about obesity including the biologic basis and clinical management.

This clinical report demonstrated the use of polyetheretherketone (PEEK) for manufacturing of custom-made post and core in weakened endodontically treated central incisors. The PEEK structure was manufactured using computer-aided design/computer-aided manufacturing (CAD/CAM). The optimal fit of this custom-made endodontic post allowed a thinner cement layer; and removed the need to manufacture a core build-up. While supplementary clinical trials and in vitro studies are needed to totally elucidate the advantages and limitations of PEEK as an option for post and core manufacturing, this case report showed that it can be promising for a predictable and simplified treatment with five years of success.

Omega-3 (ω-3) polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) are nominated to minimize the risk of lifestyle-related diseases. This study aimed to establish a strategy for ω-3 targeted delivery to enrich broiler meat, using ultrasound-assisted preparation of nanoemulsions. In vitro results indicated that stabilized nanoemulsions tend to have a controlled release behavior in simulated gastrointestinal fluids. Regarding the in vivo study, flaxseed oil-loaded nanoemulsions improved the growth performance, lipid profile, and oxidative stability. A greater ω-3 incorporation along with a greater content of its derivatives and a favorably lower ω-6/ω-3 were detected in the broiler meat fed with nanoemulsions containing flaxseed oil. A remarkable up-regulation was detected in the expression of long chain fatty acid desaturases and elongases by nanoencapsulated flaxseed oil. In short, this study revealed that flaxseed oil-loaded nanoemulsions have the potential for targeted delivery and to enrich broiler meat with ω-3 fatty acids.

Reports from bottled water (BW) industries show a rapidly increasing rate of global bottled water consumption. The present paper contains data on chemical and microbial quality of bottled waters marketed in Gonabad city, Iran. The data on the effect of time and storing conditions on microbial quality of bottled water also is reported. The physical and chemical parameters of all 9 studied BW brands meet well with those mentioned on the labels. All BW sampled also were free of pathogenic indicators (total coliforms, fecal coliforms, fecal streptococci and clostridium perfringens). BWs kept in refrigerator have minimal heterotrophic and pathogenic bacterial count. The highest bacterial count was observed when BWs were exposed to indirect sunlight at room temperature. Presence of heterotrophic and especially pathogenic bacteria reduced significantly when the samples were placed to direct sunlight. In all samples, apart from where they were kept, the heterotrophic and pathogenic bacterial counts showed an increasing trend after bottling. Keywords: Microbial quality, Chemical quality, Bottled water

Introduction Today, synthetic Dye are extensively used different industries such as textiles, pulp, leather, food and cosmetic. Doys contained wastewater to prevent environmental consequences of must be treated effectively. The present work aimed to investigate the potential application of water treatment ferric sludge in the removal of Methylene blue (MB). Materials and Methods The present experimental work was done on aqueous synthetic samples and in batch sorption mode. The effects of operating variables (pH, dose, contact time, an initial concentration of color), as well as kinetic and isotherm studies also included in this work. The adsorbent was prepared by drying the waste sludge treatment plant at 105C °. Results The maximum MB removal of was observed at a pH of 11, a contact time of 90 minutes, absorbance dose of 4 g/L and 25 mg/L of methylene blue. The conformity of kinetic and equilibrium data by psedu-second order kinetic and Freundlich models demonstrate that the adsorption occurs in heterogeneous and multi-layer. Conclusion The experimental studies demonstrate the potential use of dried ferric sludge in methylene blue removal from contaminated samples.

Background and Purpose COVID-19 is a new strain of viruses that causes life stoppage worldwide. At this time, the new coronavirus COVID-19 is spreading rapidly across the world and poses a threat to people’s health. Experimental medical tests and analysis have shown that the infection of lungs occurs in almost all COVID-19 patients. Although Computed Tomography of the chest is a useful imaging method for diagnosing diseases related to the lung, chest X-ray (CXR) is more widely available, mainly due to its lower price and results. Deep learning (DL), one of the significant popular artificial intelligence techniques, is an effective way to help doctors analyze how a large number of CXR images is crucial to performance. Materials and Methods In this article, we propose a novel perceptual two-layer image fusion using DL to obtain more informative CXR images for a COVID-19 dataset. To assess the proposed algorithm performance, the dataset used for this work includes 87 CXR images acquired from 25 cases, all of which were confirmed with COVID-19. The dataset preprocessing is needed to facilitate the role of convolutional neural networks (CNN). Thus, hybrid decomposition and fusion of Nonsubsampled Contourlet Transform (NSCT) and CNN_VGG19 as feature extractor was used. Results Our experimental results show that imbalanced COVID-19 datasets can be reliably generated by the algorithm established here. Compared to the COVID-19 dataset used, the fuzed images have more features and characteristics. In evaluation performance measures, six metrics are applied, such as QAB/F, QMI, PSNR, SSIM, SF, and STD, to determine the evaluation of various medical image fusion (MIF). In the QMI, PSNR, SSIM, the proposed algorithm NSCT + CNN_VGG19 achieves the greatest and the features characteristics found in the fuzed image is the largest. We can deduce that the proposed fusion algorithm is efficient enough to generate CXR COVID-19 images that are more useful for the examiner to explore patient status. Conclusions A novel image fusion algorithm using DL for an imbalanced COVID-19 dataset is the crucial contribution of this work. Extensive results of the experiment display that the proposed algorithm NSCT + CNN_VGG19 outperforms competitive image fusion algorithms.

Chest X-ray (CXR) imaging is one of the most feasible diagnosis modalities for early detection of the infection of COVID-19 viruses, which is classified as a pandemic according to the World Health Organization (WHO) report in December 2019. COVID-19 is a rapid natural mutual virus that belongs to the coronavirus family. CXR scans are one of the vital tools to early detect COVID-19 to monitor further and control its virus spread. Classification of COVID-19 aims to detect whether a subject is infected or not. In this article, a model is proposed for analyzing and evaluating grayscale CXR images called Chest X-Ray COVID Network (CXRVN) based on three different COVID-19 X-Ray datasets. The proposed CXRVN model is a lightweight architecture that depends on a single fully connected layer representing the essential features and thus reducing the total memory usage and processing time verse pre-trained models and others. The CXRVN adopts two optimizers: mini-batch gradient descent and Adam optimizer, and the model has almost the same performance. Besides, CXRVN accepts CXR images in grayscale that are a perfect image representation for CXR and consume less memory storage and processing time. Hence, CXRVN can analyze the CXR image with high accuracy in a few milliseconds. The consequences of the learning process focus on decision making using a scoring function called SoftMax that leads to high rate true-positive classification. The CXRVN model is trained using three different datasets and compared to the pre-trained models: GoogleNet, ResNet and AlexNet, using the fine-tuning and transfer learning technologies for the evaluation process. To verify the effectiveness of the CXRVN model, it was evaluated in terms of the well-known performance measures such as precision, sensitivity, F1-score and accuracy. The evaluation results based on sensitivity, precision, recall, accuracy, and F1 score demonstrated that, after GAN augmentation, the accuracy reached 96.7% in experiment 2 (Dataset-2) for two classes and 93.07% in experiment-3 (Dataset-3) for three classes, while the average accuracy of the proposed CXRVN model is 94.5%.

A green synthesis approach was conducted to prepare amine-functionalized bio-graphene (AFBG) as an efficient and low cost adsorbent that can be obtained from agricultural wastes. In this study, bio-graphene was successfully used to remove Ciprofloxacin (CIP) from synthetic solutions. The efficacy of adsorbent as a function of operating variables (i.e. pH, time, AFBG dose and CIP concentration) was described by a polynomial model. A optimal99.3% experimental removal was achieved by adjusting the mixing time, AFBG dose, pH and CIP concentration to 58.16, 0.99, 7.47, and 52.9, respectively. Kinetic model revealed that CIP diffusion into the internal layers of AFBG controls the rate of the process. Furthermore, the sorption process was in monolayer with a maximum monolayer capacity of 172.6 mg/g. Adsorption also found to be favored under higher CIP concentrations. The thermodynamic parameters (ΔG°0, and ΔS°>0) demonstrated that the process is endothermic and spontaneous in nature. The regeneration study showed that the AFBG could simply regenerated without significant lost in adsorption capacity.

Phenol is a hazardous organic chemical that introduced into the environment by industrial and pharmaceutical discharges. As a versatile option for phenol removal, adsorption would be viable if it accompanying with low cost adsorbents. This article described a natural, very cheap and local available adsorbent for phenol removal. Phenol showed a high affinity to Citrullus colocynthis waste ash which mainly composed of SiO2 (41.6%), Al2O3 (17.3%) and MgO (15.9%). Up to 70% of phenol adsorbed in the first 30 min of agitation. The phenol removal was increased by increasing adsorbent dose (0.5–10 g/L) and decreasing pH (2–12) and pollutant concentration (10–100 mg/L). The positive value of ∆H° in thermodynamic data (0.06) revealed that the process is endothermic. The high and positive value of ∆S° (13.01) and negative values of ∆G° (− 5.36 to − 7.28), showed a high affinity of phenol to the adsorbent and the spontaneous nature of the adsorption. Isotherm modelling revealed that the phenol molecules adsorbed in multilayer with the maximum adsorption capacity of 173.2 mg/g. The rate limiting step in the sorption process was chemisorption, based on the kinetic data. Keywords: Phenol, Adsorption, Citrullus colocynthis, Thermodynamic, Water

A lack of access to safe drinking water can lead to adverse health effects such as infection, disease, and undesirable aesthetic problems. The current study focused on the investigation of groundwater quality in Tiran's villages (Isfahan province, Iran). To determine essential microbiological quality, water samples were collected from 46 randomly-selected water wells during a one-year period. The parameters of pH and chlorine were measured on-site. Turbidity was measured at 420 nm using a DR5000 spectrophotometer. Microbiological tests including general thermoforms, Escherichia coli, and thermophiles were carried out according to the National Iranian Standard Method 3759. Data showed that 1.8% of the villages under study had contaminated water resources. The turbidity values for 94.5% of the resources were within recommended limits (

While fluoride (F) is an essential anion to keep the human body healthy, high F intake could lead to serious health problems. The monitoring of F in drinking water as the main route of F intake, is a key factor in preventing its negative health consequences. Here, we present the F levels in drinking water distribution networks of Khorasan Razavi province in Iran which collected during 2016–2017. The non-cancer human risk attributed to F in municipal and rural regions, also, estimated by calculating the chronic daily intake (CDI) and hazard quotient (HQ) for adults and children. Samples taken from drinking water distribution network in 112 different locations across the Khorasan Razavi and the F concentration determined using standard SPADNS Method. Having a minimum of 0.09 and 0.16 and a maximum of 1.7 and 1.1 mg L−1, the mean F level in municipal and rural samples were 0.74 and 0.59 mg L−1, respectively. The mean CDI values for F in municipal samples were 1.3×10−2, 3.34×10−4, and 8.56×10−6 mg kg−1day−1, for men, women, and children, respectively. The CDI for rural samples were 1.51×10−2, 3.88×10−4, and 9.96×10−6 mg kg−1day−1, for men, women, and children, respectively. The mean HQ of F for men, women, and children in municipal and rural samples were 2.17×10−1, 5.56×10−3, and 1.43×10−4, and 2.44×10−1, 6.26×10−3 and 1.61×10−4, respectively. Locations with a HQ>1, needs appropriate strategies for reducing the F level in drinking water to prevent the potential health risks. Keywords: Fluoride, Health risk assessment, Drinking water, Khorasan Razavi

A water stable and hybrid nonporous adsorbent, cubic zeolitic imidazolate framework-8 (ZIF-8), was synthesized for Acid orange 7 (AO7) removal from aqueous solutions in batch mode. Central composite design was utilized to explore the individual and interaction effects of pH, AO7 concentration, ZIF-8 dosage and contact time on dye adsorption. A second order polynomial equation (R2 = 0.9852, LOF = 0.1419) developed for prediction of the AO7 removal. Sorption model revealed that the adsorbent dosage and the dye concentration are major factors that controlled the AO7 removal efficiency. AO7 removal increased from 55 to 80% by increasing ZIF-8 dosage from 0.2 to 1 g/L. The dye removal, on the other hand, decreased from 84 to 70% with increasing AO7 concentration from 10 to 100 mg/L and increased from 60% to 80% by decreasing pH from 12 to 4. The dye removal followed the pseudo second order kinetic and the Langmuir isotherm model. The maximum monolayer adsorption capacity of 80.47 mg dye/g of ZIF-8 was obtained according to the Langmuir model. Keywords: Adsorption, Acid orange 7, Cubic ZIF-8, Central composite design

Metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) are currently recognized as unique platforms for environmental studies. This study evaluated the potential of nine MOFs from ZIF-8, ZIF-67, and UIO-66 families for the removal of ciprofloxacin (CIP), a toxic, bio-accumulative, and persistent fluoroquinolone antibiotic. ZIF-67-SO4, with a rhombic crystalline morphology and 1375 m2/g BET surface area, has the highest CIP adsorption efficiency among the studied MOFs. The mathematical sorption model predicted that the highest CIP removal (99.2%) occurs when adsorbent dose, pH, and agitation time are adjusted to 6.82, 832.4 mg/L, and 39.95 min, respectively. Further studies revealed that the CIP adsorbed onto ZIF-67-SO4 in monolayer (qmax: 2537.5 mg/g) and chemisorption controlled the rate of the process. Mass transfer kinetic coefficients improved significantly by sonication at 35 KHz in comparison with mechanical agitation. Thermodynamic parameters (minus signs of ∆G° [7.8 to 14.2], positive signs of ∆H° (58.9 KJ/mol), and ∆S° (0.23 KJ/mol·K)) demonstrated the spontaneous, endothermic, and chemical sorption of CIP. The level of cobalt leached from ZIF-67-SO4 structure varied 1.2−4.5 mg/L, depending on pH, mixing time, and agitation type. In conclusion, the excellent adsorption properties of ZIF-67-SO4 for CIP, made it an outstanding candidate for environmental protection purposes.

Praise be to God, Lord of the worlds, who guided us and brought us out of darkness into light, and prayers and peace be upon the messenger as a mercy to the worlds, who delivered the message and advised the nation, and all his family and companions. Digital currencies are one of the modern calamities that many people wonder about, some are confused about, and many wonder how to deal with them. Is it an illusion or reality? Most of the dealers of digital currencies wonder about its legal ruling and whether the provisions that apply to money issued by official state banks also apply to it. Therefore, the research aims to clarify the ruling on zakat on digital currencies from the perspective of the Noble Qur'an and the purified Sunnah of the Prophet. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study focused on addressing the heat generation issue in Lithium-Ion battery packs (LIBPs). By simulating three LIBPs arranged in series within a duct, the momentum and energy conservation equations were solved using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) to investigate cooling performance on the LIBPs' temperature. To enhance cooling, copper oxide nanoparticles were added to pure water to improve the thermal conductivity of the working fluid. Various cases were simulated to examine the effects of Reynolds number at inlet and volume fraction of copper oxide nanoparticles on flow parameters (streamlines, vortices, pressure drop) and heat transfer parameters (temperature distribution, maximum and average temperature of each LIBP) within the duct. Also, this study analyzed exergoeconomics by considering exergies and initial investment. The results demonstrate that increasing the volume fraction from 0 to 4 % at Re = 60 reduced the maximum temperature of LIBP 1, 2, and 3 by 2.19 °C, 2.26 °C, and 2.64 °C, respectively, while it had no remarkable impact on the maximum temperature of LIBPs for bigger Reynolds numbers.