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Abstract

Naphthalene is a carcinogenic compound and its environmental release poses a major risk to human and aquatic health. Therefore, the application of nanomaterial technologies for naphthalene removal from wastewater has attracted significant attention. In this research, for the first time, the performance of IRMOF-3 for naphthalene removal from aqueous media is evaluated. IRMOF-3 with a specific surface area of 718.11 m²·g−¹ has the ability to absorb naphthalene from synthetic wastewater to a high extent. The structures and morphology of IRMOF-3 were determined by FT-IR, XRD, SEM and BET analyses. Thirty adsorption experiments were conducted to obtain the best conditions for naphthalene removal. An optimum naphthalene removal efficiency of 80.96% was obtained at IRMOF-3 amounts of 0.1 g·L−¹, a solution concentration of 15 mg·L−¹, a contact time of 60 min and a pH = 11. The results indicate that the lower the concentration of naphthalene, the higher its dispersion at the surface of the porous nanostructure. Increasing naphthalene concentration results in its accumulation on porous nanostructures that clog cavities. In addition, high contact time provides ample opportunity for naphthalene to penetrate the cavities and pores which facilitates crystallization phenomena deep in the pores. Finally, the results of this study revealed that IRMOF-3 is one of the most effective adsorbents for naphthalene removal from wastewater.