Quantitative Study on Polymer Flocculation Mechanism Based on Mathematical Morphology

Until now, understanding of polymer flocculation has remained restricted within the qualitative explanations of the bridge unite theory and the electricity neutralization theory, because people not only lacked the systemic knowl- edge of the polymer flocculation mechanism, the flocculation dynamic process study and the flocculation effect esti- mate, but also could not penetrate within the flocculation process microscopic field to obtain the structural character parameters such as floccule structure, the frame bridge models and so on. In this paper, not only coal slurry flocculation images were photographed by using the transmission electron microscope, but also the basic theory of the mathematical morphology was applied to the coal slurry flocculation image processing. The steps and methods of the mathematical morphology were expounded in detail. The micro-structural parameters such as the flocculate size and the bridge length were obtained, which combined the microscopic flocculation grain configuration observations with the macroscopic flocculation effect, so as to get the maximum amount of veracious information to describe and explain the whole floc- culation course by rule and line. On this basis, not only the flocculation models of polymers in the coal slurry are sug- gested, but the quantitative study on flocculation mechanism has been achieved.

Studying Flocculation Mechanism of Chitosan with Pyrene-fluorescence Probe Method

A peak/ratio in pyrene-fluorescence spectrum was employed to measure the polarity of micro-environment of chitosan adsorbing pyrene molecules. The authors have in the first time detected the pyrene-fluorescence spectrum of chitosan with different degrees of deacetylation (D.D.), and found the relationship between the flocculation of bentonite colloid by chitosan and the peak/ratio values of different molecular weight (M.W.) and D.D. of chitosan. We find that M.W. plays a key role in the flocculation, but D.D. has limited effect on it. From micro-environmental structure of view, it can be proved that the interparticle bridging rather than charge neutralization dominates the flocculation with chitosan.

Flocculation Mechanism of Synthetic Goethite Suspension Using Hydroxamated Polymer and Sodium Polyacrylate

The flocculation effects of homemade hydroxamated flocculant(HPAA)and commercially available sodium polyacrylate(PAAS)on synthetic goethite suspensions with different solid contents were studied.The adsorption mechanism of HPAA or PAAS on the surfaces of goethite was investigated.The settling rate of 50 g/L goethite suspension with HPAA(1.74 m/h)was faster than that with PAAS(0.54 m/h),which indicated that HPAA exhibits better flocculation performance than PAAS does.It could be found that the stretching vibration of carbonyl band in hydroxamic acid groups of HPAA was downshifted from 1 654 cm^(-1) to 1 645 cm^(-1) and a new adsorption band appeared at 1 455 cm-1,which demonstrated that a five-membered ring chelate may be formed among iron atoms of goethite surfaces,the hydroxyl groups and the carbonyl groups in hydroxamic acid groups of HPAA.In the case of PAAS,the separation of the asymmetric and symmetric stretches of the carboxylate groups in adsorbed PAAS was 163 cm-1,which was greater than that of unadsorbed PAAS with 157 cm^(-1).There was no indication of a contribution from the monodentate adsorption between iron atoms of goethite surfaces and carboxylate groups of PAAS,but there may exist a bi-dentate bridging structure.Compared with synthetic goethite,XPS curve fittings of Fe 2p spectra showed that the binding energies of the main Fe 2p3/2 and Fe 2p1/2 resolved peaks on HPAA-treated goethite surfaces were correspondingly decreased by 0.9 and 0.7 e V,while those on PAAS-treated goethite surfaces were correspondingly decreased by 0.7 and 0.3 e V.The characteristic N 1s peak of HPAA and C 1s peak of PAAS were correspondingly detected on HPAA-treated and PAAS-treated goethites,and a binding energy change of N 1s spectrum of adsorbed HPAA was observed.The relative atomic ratios of C/Fe,N/Fe and O/Fe on HPAA-treated and PAAS-treated goethite surfaces were increased.All the results suggested that HPAA or PAAS was adsorbed on the goethite surfaces by the chemisorption,and a stronger adsorption of HPAA on the goethite surfaces happened than that of PAAS.

Effect of viscosity,basicity and organic content of composite flocculant on the decolorization performance and mechanism for reactive dyeing wastewater

A coagulation/flocculation process using the composite flocculant polyaluminum chloride-epichlorohydrin dimethylamine （PAC- EPI-DMA） was employed for the treatment of an anionic azo dye （Reactive Brilliant Red K-2BP dye）. The effect of viscosity 01）, basicity （B = [OH]/[Al]） and organic content （Wp） on the flocculation performance as well as the mechanism of PAC-EPI-DMA flocculant were investigated. The η was the key factor affecting the dye removal efficiency of PAC-EPI-DMA. PAC-EPI-DMA with an intermediate η （2400 mPa.sec） gave higher decolorization efficiency by adsorption bridging and charge neutralization due to the co-effect of PAC and EPI-DMA polymers. The Wp of the composite flocculant was a minor important factor for the flocculation. The adsorption bridging of PAC-EPI-DMA with η of 300 or 4300 mPa.sec played an important role with the increase of Wp, whereas the charge neutralization of them was weaker with the increase of Wp. There was interaction between Wp and B on the removal of reactive dye. The composite flocculant with intermediate viscosity and organic content was effective for the treatment of reactive dyeing wastewater, which could achieve high reactive dye removal efficiency with low organic dosage.

Cationic content effects of biodegradable amphoteric chitosan-based flocculants on the flocculation properties

A series of biodegradable amphoteric chitosan-based flocculants （3-chloro-2-hydroxypropyl trimethyl ammonium chloride （CTA） modified carboxymethyl chitosan, denoted as CMC-CTA） with different substitution degrees of CTA were prepared successfully. The content of carboxymethyl groups in each CMC-CTA sample was kept almost constant. The solubility of the various flocculants showed that, higher cationic content of flocculants caused a better solubility. The flocculation experiments using kaolin suspension as synthetic water at the laboratory scale indicated that the substitution degree of CTA was one of the key factors for the flocculation properties. With the increase of cationic content, the flocculants were demonstrated better flocculation performance and lower dosage requirement. Flocculation kinetics model of particles collisions combining zeta potential and turbidity measurements was employed to investigate the effects of the cationic content of the flocculants on the flocculation properties from the viewpoint of flocculation mechanism in detail. Furthermore, flocculation performance using raw water from Zhenjiang part of Yangtze River at the pilot scale showed the similar effects to those at the laboratory scale.

Coagulation behaviors and in-situ flocs characteristics of composite coagulants in cyanide-containing wastewater:Role of cationic polyelectrolyte

In this paper, composite coagulants （PFS, PFSC05, PFSC1 and PFSC5）, prepared by mixing polyferric sulfate （PFS） and cationic polyelectrolyte （CP） coagulants with different weight percent （Wv） of CP （Wp = 0%, 0.5%, 1% and 5%, respectively）, were adopted to treat cyanide-containing wastewater. PFSC5 exhibited superior coagulation performances at optimal conditions： the removal of total cyanide （TCN） and chemical oxygen demand （COD） was 95%-97% and 50%-55%, respectively. The effects of CP on the properties and structure of flocs were investigated by laser diffraction instrument and small-angle laser light scattering （SALLS）, respectively. The results show that the flocs of PFSC5 have higher growth rate, higher strength factor and lower recovery factor than other flocs. They are also much denser and more uniform owing to the higher fractal dimension （DO and less microflocs （10-100μm）. Furthermore, the dense structure of the PFSC5 flocs can be restored after shear and is more resistant to hydraulic conditions. Particularly, detailed morphology evolution of the flocs was in-situ detected by on-line particle imaging. Due to strong ionic strength in wastewater, the CP in PFSC5 plays a significant role of adsorption, while the main mechanism of CP is electrostatic patch aggregation during the PFSC05 systems.