Optimization of graphene polypyrrole for enhanced adsorption of moxifloxacin antibiotic: an experimental design approach and isotherm investigation

BMC Chemistry (2024) 18:113 Ishaq et al. BMC Chemistry https://doi.org/10.1186/s13065-024-01208-0 Open Access RESEARCH Optimization of graphene polypyrrole for enhanced adsorption of moxifloxacin antibiotic: an experimental design approach and isotherm investigation Sara Ishaq1*, Ahmed H. Nadim2, Sawsan M. Amer2 and Heba T. Elbalkiny1 Abstract The presence of antibiotics in water systems had raised a concern about their potential harm to the aquatic environment and human health as well as the possible development of antibiotic resistance. Herein, this study investigates the power of adsorption using graphene-polypyrrole (GRP-PPY) nanoparticles as a promising approach for the removal of Moxifloxacin HCl (MXF) as a model antibiotic drug. GRP-PPY nanoparticles synthesis was performed with a simple and profitable method, leading to the formation of high surface area particles with excellent adsorption properties. Characterization was assessed with various techniques, including Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD) and Brunauer–Emmett–Teller (BET). Box-Behnken experimental design was developed to optimize the adsorption process. Critical parameters such as initial antibiotic concentration, nanoparticle concentration, and pH were investigated. The Freundlich isotherm model provided a good fit to the experimental data, indicating multilayer adsorption of MXF onto the GRP-PPY-NP. As a result, a high adsorption capacity of MXF (92%) was obtained in an optimum condition of preparing 30 μg/mL of the drug to be adsorbed by 1 mg/mL of GRP-PPY-NP in pH 9 within 1 h in a room temperature. Moreover, the regeneration and reusability of GRP-PPY-NP were investigated. They could be effectively regenerated for 3 cycles using appropriate desorption agents without significant loss in adsorption capacity. Overall, this study highlights the power of GRP-PPY-NP as a highly efficient adsorbent for the removal of MXF from wastewater as it is the first time to use this NP for a pharmaceutical product which shows the study’s novelty, and the findings provide valuable insights into the development of sustainable and effective wastewater treatment technologies for combating antibiotic contamination in aquatic environments. Keywords Adsorption, Wastewater treatment, Nanoparticles, Graphene polypyrrole, Moxifloxacin HCl *Correspondence: Sara Ishaq 1 Analytical Chemistry Department, Faculty of Pharmacy, MSA University: October University for Modern Sciences and Arts, Cairo, Egypt 2 Pharmaceutical Analytical Chemistry Department, Faculty of Pharmacy, Cairo University, Cairo, Egypt Introduction Waterborne disease development, poor sanitation and low quality of water supply are all posing global challenges because of the high demand by the huge rising populations [21]. The expectations refer that the average water demand per person will drop by a third, which may lead to a health disaster if inadequate measures and steps are not taken seriously to avoid this situation. Pharmaceuticals are an important group of potential © The Author(s) 2024. Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativeco mmons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data. Ishaq et al. BMC Chemistry (2024) 18:113 micropollutants that have recently attracted much attention and have been found in trace amounts in a variety of environmental water samples, including surface water, ocean, groundwater, and effluents from sewage treatment plants [31, 32, 44],and [15]. Unfortunately, the existing water treatment technology is still considered inadequate for micropollutants elimination and removal, as they are not created to handle this specific class of pollutants [21]. Examples of such pharmaceutical active compounds are antibiotics which have a high biological activity, are extremely beneficial to humans, and have been at the forefront of prescribed and over-the-counter medications. Although they are extremely beneficial for human health, their presence in the environment nonetheless raises great concerns. According to Adeyemi et al. [1], the emergence of antibiotic resistance is the most important concern. Some isolated bacteria that were discovered in the sewage reactors of some treatment plants already showed signs of antibiotic resistance to powerful antibiotics such as fluoroquinolones (FQ) [1]. Since the COVID pandemic, an increase in their consumption worldwide has risen especially for MXF (S1, Supplemental Material) [16]. FQ antibiotics such as MXF are only partially metabolized in the body and are partially excreted in their pharmaceutically active form (> 50%). Therefore, the detected amount of FQ antibiotic residues in common wastewater treatment plant effluent has been increased. These concentrations may induce quinolone-resistant infections and persistent harm in aquatic organisms by applying selective pressure to microbial populations [37]. The inability of conventional wastewater treatment plants to get rid of the waste clearly shows the urgent need for cutting-edge technologies that can effectively deal with these compounds. The new techniques should ideally be able to remove pollutants, have low energy requirements, be cost-effective, be environmentally friendly, and be able to inactivate resistant pathogens. Adsorption is a type of tertiary stage of wastewater removal. It occurs by the transfer of the pollutant phase into another phase, the most common is that this phase is solid. It is used to remove dissolved impurities from water [35]. The adsorption technique has many advantages to be mentioned as it is easy to operate and design [10]. Also, it works at mild operation conditions and a wide range of pH with high efficiency. It requires a low energy in comparison to other methods making it an environmentally friendly method almost without any toxic products [19]. A lot of materials can be used as adsorbent as well, and the high surface area of adsorbent materials allows a high utilization and select (...truncated)