Nanoscale hematite and organic acids, such as citrate, are ubiquitous in natural systems.  Together, these compounds can influence the fate and transport of organic and inorganic contaminants throughout the environment.  As the size of a hematite particle is decreased, different sorption modes become more important as the distribution of reactive crystalline faces on the hematite accordingly adjust.  We examined the impact the change in particle size has on the adsorption of citrate to the surface of hematite particles by performing batch adsorption experiments under a variety of environmental condition and using attenuated total reflectance - Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (ATR-FTIR) to analyze the structure of the adsorbed citrate molecule to hematite in the resulting wet paste.  Results suggest the adsorption of citrate does not scale with changing size of the hematite particles.  We also observe the mode of adsorption of citrate to hematite shifts as the size of the particle decreases.

Particle-size dependencies in the adsorption of citrate to hematite

243rd National Meeting (2012)

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