Quantitative determination of chromate using modified mesoporous system

Chromate is a widespread environmental pollutant that requires considerable attention, because Cr(VI) ion exhibits a variety of toxic, mutagenic, and carcinogenic effects. MCM-41 mesoporous silica is an ideal material for the design and preparation of selective adsorbent for CrO42- because of its enormous surface area. The present work illustrates that it is possible to achieve quantitative determination of chromate at low concentration using mesoporous adsorbents made by grafting organic functional moieties into MCM-41 pores. Functionalization of MCM-41 was done by 3-aminopropyltriethoxysilane (APTES). The product was characterized by XRD, BET, DRS and FTIR. Determination of chromate was done by combined solid-phase extraction-diffuse reflectance spectroscopic methods (SPE-DRS).