Photocatalytic Oxidation of Morphine, Methamphetamine and Ketamine
Date Issued
2012
Date
2012
Author(s)
Shiu, Ying-Jie
Abstract
In recent years, concerns over the emergence of previously unregulated anthropogenic contaminants in natural environment have escalated drastically. Among which chemical persistent organic compounds and environmental hormone pollutants are reported to be incompletely removed during conventional wastewater treatment processes in Taiwan. The presence of these emerging contaminants in the natural environment could potentially cause adverse effects to aquatic organism and human health. For this reason, the purpose of this research is to investigate the efficiency of advanced photocatalytic reaction system in removing three of the most commonly detected controlled substances: morphine, methamphetamines and ketamine in Taiwan. Lin et al., (2010) reported significant quantities of these controlled drugs in Xindian River basin and hospital effluents with concentrations up to 206 ~ 1240 ng /L.
The light sources for heterogeneous photocatalytic reaction system in this research are traditional UV light and UVLED with catalyst TiO2 and ZnO. HPLC-MS/MS measures C/Co and Langumuir-Hinselwood pseudo first-order reaction kinetics to describe the dynamic behavior of photocatalytic reaction and to understand the fate of ketamine, morphine and methamphetamine in the photocatalytic system.
The results indicate similar degradation trend for all three controlled drugs. TiO2 demonstrates to be more efficient than ZnO as a photo catalyst. UV light is more efficient than UVLED. Wavelength of 254 nm UV light (intensity of 3.61 mW/cm2), and 0.04 g/L dosage of TiO2 is the best operating condition in this study where all the controlled drugs were removed up to 99.9% after 30 minutes of reaction time. Pseudo first-order reaction rate constant for ketamine = 1.66 (min-1), morphine = 6.23 (min-1) and methamphetamine = 2.68 (min-1). In this study, with the dosage of TiO2 at 0.4 g/L and wavelength of 365 nm UVLED light, the oxidation of all three compounds also reached 99.9% removal efficiency after 30 minutes of reaction time with pseudo first-order rate constant of ketamine = 0.61 min-1, morphine = 1.47 min-1 and methamphetamine = 0.63 min–1. As a result, UVLED demonstrates to be a viable alternative photocatalytic light source from the traditional UV light as it produces zero toxic end products and longer life cycle. This study confirms the feasibility of heterogeneous photocatalytic oxidation for ketamine, morphine and methamphetamine.
Subjects
controlled drugs(illicit drugs)
Heterogeneous photocatalytic reaction
morphine
ketamine
methamphetamine
SDGs
Type
thesis
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