Síntesis y caracterización de quitosano cuaternario nativo y reticulado en polvo para su aplicación en la adsorción de aniones metálicos

The adsorption of anionic metals has always been a problem in biosorption, due to the lack of positively charged adsorbents that allow an efficient interaction. This research proposes a new batch of adsorbents by chemical modification of chitosan. Two reactions were combined to achieve this goal: quaternarization by the reaction with glycidyltrimethylammonium (QC1) and the quaternarization coupled with the cross-linkage with glutaraldehyde (QC2). Both adsorbents were characterized by spectroscopic techniques, thermogravimetric analysis, specific surface determination, scanning electron microscopy and conductometry. This investigation was completed with the evaluation of these adsorbents for the adsorption of gold and chromium ions. The results are very promising, more with gold, achieving an adsorption capacity of 45mg Au/g of adsorbent. The use of these adsorbents constitutes a promise in the biosorption area for the removal of anions of industrial and environmental interest.