Eco-friendly and inexpensive adsorbent rice husk to help clean Ganga
Varanasi. Researchers at School of Biochemical Engineering, IIT (BHU) Dr. Vishal Mishra and his Ph.D. students Veer Singh and Jyoti Singh have synthesized an eco-friendly adsorbent which can remove toxic heavy metal ions such as hexavalent chromium from wastewater.
The hexavalent chromium is responsible for several types of health problems in the human like various types of cancers, kidney and liver failure. This is new eco-friendly product synthesized from rice husk via several modification. Dr. Mishra said that this adsorbent is very effective for removal of toxic metal ions from wastewater compared to other conventional methods and take less time to remove toxic metals contamination. End of the wastewater treatment process, this adsorbent can easily separate from solution and can be used in the next adsorption cycle. Dr. Mishra and his students have been proved this adsorbent shows effective adsorption-cum-reduction of hexavalent chromium. Dr. Mishra and his researcher scholar Veer Singh and Jyoti Singh published this work in the “Journal of Environmental Chemical Engineering” journal.
In developing countries, the water-borne diseases are the major problem. According to World Health Organization (WHO) each year 3.4 million people, mostly children, die from water-related diseases. WHO reports that over 2.6 billion people lack access to clean water, which is responsible for about 2.2 million deaths annually, of which 1.4 million are children. Improving water quality can reduce the global water-borne diseases.
Cancer due to heavy metals is a severe problem worldwide. The developing countries such as India and China are very prone to heavy metal contaminations. Human intake heavy metals mainly through skin contact, intake of contaminated water or contamination in the food product. The heavy metals not only cause normal diseases in human body but also results in dangerous disease like cancer. Report from water resources ministry says that large number of Indian population drink water with lethal levels of toxic heavy metals, about 239 million people across 153 districts in 21 states drink water that contains unacceptably high levels of toxic metal ions. WHO has warned that long-term intake water containing toxic heavy metals such as Pb, Cr(VI), Cd and as may cause cancer of skin, gall bladder, kidney or lungs.
Socio economic aspect of this research: This research is focused on the cost-effective, eco-friendly method for removal of heavy metal ions such hexavalent chromium from water. Rice huskies easily available worldwide. Adsorbent synthesized from rice husk and surface of this adsorbent modified through iron doped. Iron doping make it suitable for transformation of Cr (VI) to Cr (III). Cr (III) is 100 times less toxic with comparison Cr (VI).
