Efficient removal of Rhodamine-B dye using sulfonated/un-sulfonated three-dimensional mesoporous carbon nitride prepared from KIT-6 template: kinetics, modelling, thermodynamic analysis

Mesoporous carbon nitride (MCN-K) was prepared using mesoporous KIT-6 material as a template and ethylenediamine and carbon tetrachloride as N and C sources, respectively. The synthesized MCN-K was treated with sulfuric acid under different experimental conditions, thus obtaining sulfonated MCN-KS adsorbents. The effects of initial solution pH, initial dye concentration, adsorbent amount, and temperature on Rhodamine-B (Rh-B) dye removal were investigated. The XRD, FT-IR, and N₂ adsorption–desorption analyses confirmed that the mesoporous carbon nitride structure was successfully synthesized. The high nitrogen content (C/N molar ratio: 4.0) of the MCN-K sample was confirmed by (carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen and sulfur) CHNS elemental analysis. The XPS analysis was used to characterize the chemical states of the C, N and S atoms in the MCN-K and MCN-KS sorbents. It was found that there was not much difference between the removal percentages (93.13–89.92%) obtained in the pH range (4–12) studied. This result was attributed to the zwitter-ion form of Rh-B. The exothermic nature of the adsorption process of Rh-B on the MCN-K sorbent was determined by adsorption experiments performed at different temperatures. Adsorption capacities obtained from the Langmuir model were 185.2–104.2 mg/g in the studied temperature range. The kinetic behavior of the adsorption process was explained by the pseudo-second-order kinetic model in terms of both correlation coefficients (R² > 0.91) and q_e (35.59–190.26 mg/g) values. When the percentages of dye removal of the un-sulfonated and sulfonated samples were compared, it was found that sulfonation increased the adsorption rate considerably but did not contribute positively to the dye removal percentage.