Volltext-Downloads (blau) und Frontdoor-Views (grau)
  • search hit 1 of 1
Back to Result List

Extraction of silica gel from Sorghum bicolour (L.) moench bagasse ash

  • Sweet sorghum (Sorghum bicolor (L.) moench), a crop that is grown by subsistence farmers in Zimbabwe was used to extract silica gel in order to assess its possible use as a raw material for the production of silica-based products. The gel was prepared from sodium silicate extracted from sweet sorghum bagasse ash by sodium hydroxide leaching. Results show that maximum yield can be obtained at pH 5 and with 3 M sodium concentration. The silica gel prepared at optimum pH 5 had a bulk density of 0.5626 g/cm3 and anestimated porosity of 71.87%. Silica gel aged over 10 h had improved moisture adsorption properties. X-ray fluorescence (XRF) determinations show that the silica content in the ash is 40.1%. Characterization of sweet sorghum ash and silica gels produced at pH 5, 7 and 8.5 by Fourier Transform Infrared spectroscopy gave absorption bands similar to those reported by other researchers.Transmission electron micrographs show that silica prepared under optimum conditions is amorphous and consisted of irregular particles. Sweet sorghum proved to be a potential low cost raw material for the production of silica gel.

Download full text files

Export metadata

Additional Services

Search Google Scholar Check availability

Statistics

Show usage statistics
Metadaten
Document Type:Article
Language:English
Author:M. Mupa, C. B. Hungwe, S. Witzleben, C. Mahamadi, N. Muchanyereyi
Parent Title (English):African Journal of Pure and Applied Chemistry
Volume:9
Issue:2
First Page:12
Last Page:17
ISSN:1996-0840
URN:urn:nbn:de:hbz:1044-opus-13748
DOI:https://doi.org/10.5897/AJPAC2015.0603
Publisher:Academic Journals
Publishing Institution:Hochschule Bonn-Rhein-Sieg
Date of first publication:2015/02/26
Copyright:Copyright © 2015 Author(s) retain the copyright of this article. This article is published under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License 4.0
Keyword:Silica gel; X-ray powder diffraction (XRD); ash; bagasse; extraction; sweet sorghum
Departments, institutes and facilities:Fachbereich Angewandte Naturwissenschaften
Dewey Decimal Classification (DDC):5 Naturwissenschaften und Mathematik / 54 Chemie / 540 Chemie und zugeordnete Wissenschaften
Entry in this database:2015/04/02
Licence (German):License LogoCreative Commons - CC BY - Namensnennung 4.0 International