COPPER, FLUORESCENT AND SILVER NANOPARTICLE TRANSPORT THROUGH SANDY SEDIMENTS

The advent of nanotechnology has revolutionized many industries, including the medical, materials and clothing industries. A significant amount of research has already been conducted in the field of nanotechnology in recent years. However, very little research has, so far, been carried out on the environmental impacts of nanoparticles. Some of the more pressing issues include understanding the fate and transport of different nanoparticles in the environment. In this study, copper, fluorescent, and silver nanoparticle transport was modeled in unconfined sand aquifer models, while sorption characteristics were determined using batch experiments. The lab aquifer models were used to determine travel time, adsorption and nanoparticle dispersion within the sandy material. Chloride was used as a conservative tracer in this study. In these experiments, a pulse source was used to study the transport characteristics. Preliminary results show that there is a significant reduction and dispersion of the nanoparticles as they move through sandy material. The sorption characteristics appear to be dependent on concentration. For the silver nanoparticles, at lower concentrations (less 1 ppm), the nanoparticles displayed a classic Freundlich Isotherm, which has also been reported in other research. However, a linear isotherm was observed at higher concentrations. These sorption characteristics are being investigated further and results will be presented in this paper. The transport and sorption characteristics will be used to create a computer model to predict transport of nanoparticles from a river to a production well.