Clean Water & Sanitation

Among the numerous issues confronting our world today, two significant challenges stand out: waste management and freshwater contamination. This study addresses these issues by developing innovative recycling and circular economy techniques. For the first time, steel slag waste was converted into slag nanocomposites using a solvothermal preparation technique for wastewater treatment in an advanced oxidation process.

Electrochemical methods like electrocoagulation (EC) can remove a vast array of compounds from wastewater but are not ideal for emerging pollutants found at low concentrations (ng/L to μg/L). In contrast, enzymes are known to effectively target these pollutants, but their performance can be hindered in complex water matrices. This work explores a biocatalytic treatment assisted by electrochemical processes to remove two emerging pollutants, Bisphenol A (BPA) and Triclosan (TCS) from municipal wastewater.

Contaminated drinking water is the leading cause of diseases such as diarrhea, typhoid fever, hepatitis A and E, poliomyelitis, and cholera. The main objective of this project was the development of PVA-based hydrogels loaded with silver nanoparticles (Ag-NPs) synthesized through a green synthesis process, with biocidal activity for the treatment of contaminated water.

In this work, a response surface methodology (RSM) was used to attain optimal conditions for polyphenols extraction from Yerba Mate (YM, South-America infusion) using water as solvent under ultrasound. The following parameters were varied: mass of YM/volume of water (YM/W), pH, temperature, and time. This study helps to developing an eco-friendly and cost-effective experimental design, reducing the production of wastes, and using a very fast water-based method for the extraction.