title: Agricultural waste as a source for the production of silica nanoparticles.
abstract: The major interest of the paper deals with the extraction of silica from four natural sources such as rice husk, bamboo leaves, sugarcane bagasse and groundnut shell. These waste materials in large quantities can create a serious environmental problem. Hence, there is a need to adopt proper strategy to reduce the waste. In the present investigation, all the waste materials are subjected to moisture removal in a hot plate and sintered at 900°C for 7 h. The sintered powder was treated with 1 M NaOH to form sodium silicate and then with 6M H2SO4 to precipitate silica. The prepared silica powders were characterized by FT-IR, XRD and SEM-EDAX analysis. The silica recovered from different sources was found to vary between 52% and 78%. Magnesium substituted silica was formed from the groundnut waste and further treatment is required to precipitate silica.
authors.affiliation: Materials Chemistry Division, School of Advanced Sciences, VIT University, Vellore 632 014, India.
authors.forename: Vineet
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Vaibhav
authors.affiliation: Materials Chemistry Division, School of Advanced Sciences, VIT University, Vellore 632 014, India. Electronic address: lakesminat@yahoo.com.
authors.forename: U
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Vijayalakshmi
authors.affiliation: Chemistry Research Laboratory, Organic Chemistry Division, School of Advanced Sciences, VIT University, Vellore 632 014, India. Electronic address: mohanaroopan.s@vit.ac.in.
authors.forename: S Mohana
authors.initials: SM
authors.lastname: Roopan
mesh_terms: D000383:Agriculture; D008855:Microscopy, Electron, Scanning; D053758:Nanoparticles / Q000737:chemistry*; D012822:Silicon Dioxide / Q000737:chemistry*; D012972:Sodium Hydroxide / Q000737:chemistry; D013052:Spectrometry, X-Ray Emission; D017550:Spectroscopy, Fourier Transform Infrared; D013464:Sulfuric Acids / Q000737:chemistry; D013696:Temperature; D014866:Waste Products / Q000032:analysis*; D014961:X-Ray Diffraction
chemical_list: D013464:Sulfuric Acids; D014866:Waste Products; D012972:Sodium Hydroxide; D012822:Silicon Dioxide; C033158:sulfuric acid
keywords: Bamboo leaves; Groundnut; Nanoparticles; Rice husk; Silica; Sugarcane bagasse