Biosorption of Heavy Metals Using Agricultural Waste Peels

Heavy metal contamination of water bodies poses a significant threat to ecosystems and human health, demanding cost-effective and sustainable remediation strategies. Biosorption harnesses the intrinsic affinity of agricultural waste peels—such as those derived from bananas, citrus fruits and other crop residues—to bind and sequester metal ions from aqueous solutions. These peels are rich in functional groups (including hydroxyl, carboxyl and amino moieties) that facilitate adsorption through mechanisms of complexation, ion exchange and surface precipitation. Key operational parameters—pH, contact time, temperature and biosorbent dosage—influence removal efficiency, while characterisation via adsorption isotherms and kinetic models informs the optimisation of process design. Moreover, the potential to regenerate and reuse peel-based biosorbents underscores their promise in a circular economy framework and their applicability across industrial, domestic and agricultural effluents worldwide.

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Biosorption of Heavy Metals Using Agricultural Waste Peels publication trend

The graph below shows the total number of articles in biosorption of heavy metals using agricultural waste peels across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).

Technical terms

Biosorption: The process by which biological materials passively bind and concentrate heavy metals or other contaminants from aqueous solutions.

Adsorbent: A solid material possessing surface properties that enable the adherence of dissolved species via physical or chemical interactions.

Langmuir isotherm: A model describing monolayer adsorption onto a uniform surface with finite binding sites.

Pseudo-second-order kinetics: A rate model suggesting that chemisorption governs the adsorption process, with the rate proportional to the square of unoccupied sites.

Functional group: Specific atomic arrangements (e.g. hydroxyl, carboxyl, amino) on biosorbent surfaces responsible for metal ion coordination.

References

1. Wastewater treatment from a typical multisystem hospital using chemically modified banana peels: Taguchi parametric optimization and characterization. Applied Water Science (2024).
2. Isotherms and Kinetic Studies of Copper Removal from Textile Wastewater and Aqueous Solution Using Powdered Banana Peel Waste as an Adsorbent in Batch Adsorption Systems. International Journal of Biomaterials (2023).
3. Comparative study of the elimination of copper, cadmium, and methylene blue from water by adsorption on the citrus Sinensis peel and its activated carbon. RSC Advances (2022).