Current Environmental Engineering - Volume 4, Issue 2, 2017

Background: Arsenic is a ubiquitous element which exists in combined form and gets dissolved in water, transferred to human body on exposure through drinking water. It adversely affects human health resulting from stimulating formation of reactive oxygen species, binding to sulfhydryl sites of enzyme, re-placement of phosphate group and altering gene expression. Arsenic poisoning is threatening human be-ing globally, but Bengal Basin is the largest case of mass poisoning in the world. Method: Adsorption is an af-fordable technology available to provide arsenic free water. As(III) and As(V), are two forms commonly found in water. Both these forms can effectively adsorbed by nanocomposites. These inexpensive nano-sized core-shell materials provide sufficient way to adsorb arsenic from water to avoid their exposure to the human body. Result: This review reports the latest available literature related to highly adsorptive removal capacity of nanocomposites for As(III) and As(V). The regeneration of the spent adsorbents has been included along with critical analyses of strategies for safe disposal of exhausted adsorbents.

Background: The worldwide demand for natural dyes is nowadays of great interest due to the increased awareness on therapeutic potential and wide range of industrial applications such as in engineering, food, textile, medical and agricultural industries. These environment friendly bioresourse materials pro-duced from non-food crops have revolutionized all industrial sectors especially pharmaceutical and tex-tile industries. Method: Natural dyes are derived from naturally occurring sources such as plants, insects, and minerals without or with least chemical processing. Although, plant based natural dyes are known since time immemorial for dyeing as well as medicinal properties, the structures and protective properties of natural dyes have been recognized only in the recent past. The present review, describes the detailed information about basic chemistry of the major pigments, their medicinal importance and textile applications of naturally occurring dye yielding plants, which are helpful for further development of pharmaceutical formulations and development of value added textile materials. Result: Comparative environmental impact analysis is presented, highlighting the ecofriendliness of natural dyes and adverse ecological concerns of presently used synthetic colorants.

Objective: Water quality monitoring has been high priority to determine the current conditions of the water system. The present study evaluates the surface water quality in terms of the physicochemical parameters of the Brari-Nambal lagoon of Dal Lake, Kashmir. Method: Various physico-chemical parameters of water samples for the Brari-Nambal lagoon of the Dal Lake were determined post September 2014 floods in Kashmir. The values of physico-chemical parameters in the lake water samples were compared with those of World Health Organization (WHO) guideline. For the evaluation of the huge obtained data set, various robust statistical techniques like statistical interpretation for finding p value and Standard Ion Index (SII) which gives the interpretation of the cation and anion concentration by involving the standardization in statistics. Data treatment by mathematical methods was also done to get the results in a better and structured way. Result: Water Quality Index (WQI) was very poor and water quality falls under grade ‘D’ with values >75. Permeability Index (PI) value was 27.94 before floods and hence fit for irrigation and 24.98 after floods thereby unfit for irrigation. Kelly's ratio remains < 1 throughout and hence fit for irrigation. Sodium Adsorption Ratio (SAR) remains < 10 and therefore fit for irrigation. Magnesium Hazard (MH) values were calculated and remained < 50 and hence an indication for fit water for irrigation purposes.

Background: Accumulation of different metals and metalloids was assessed in two commonly used vegetable radish (Raphanus sativus L.) and Carrot (Daucus carota L.) irrigated with Fly ash wastewater in the peri-urban area of Badarpur Delhi, India. Method: In general, the metal and metalloid concentrations in radish and Carrot were higher at site-II irrigated with fly ash waste water than those found at Site-I irrigated with canal water. In the case of radish at both sites, the levels of metals (Cr, Mn, Fe, Co, Ni, Cu, Zn, As, Se, Mo, Cd, and Pb) were below the acceptable level except those of Mn, Ni, Mo, Cd, and Pb. At both sites, the transfer factor oscillated from 0.047-228.3 mg kg-1 with Cr having the highest transfer factor. Result: The metal pollution index in soil was found in the following order: As > Fe > Ni > Zn > Cd > Mo > Se > Co > Pb > Mn > Cr > Cu, respectively. While in the case of Carrot at both sites, the concentrations of metals and metalloids in vegetable samples irrigated with canal and fly ash waste water were observed below the allowable level except Mn, Ni, Zn, Mo, and Pb. At both sites, the transfer factor vacillated from 0.038-245.4 mg kg-1 with Cr having the highest transfer factor. Conclusion: The metal pollution index in soil was reported in the following order: Cd > Ni > Co > Se > Mn > Zn > Mo > Pb > Fe > Cr > As > Cu, respectively.

Objective: The present study address an environment friendly solution for leather dyeing by using at-mospheric pressure non-thermal plasma to improve natural dyeing. Method: In this study, changes in the surface properties of goat hide is studied after exposing grain surface of goat hide to atmospheric pressure dielectric barrier discharge generated in ammonia as discharge producing gas. Resulting changes in the surface morphology and chemical composition of after the plasma treatments is studied by various characterization techniques such as Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy, Scanning Electron Microscope and X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy. Untreated and the plasma treated samples are dyed using three commercially available natural dyes (Eco Tiger Yellow, Eco-Sun Yellow, Eco- Mango Yellow) and as-sessed by spectroscopic measurements to check improvement in dyeing properties after the plasma treatment. Result: Out of thee dyes, significant improvement in color intensity of dyed sample is observed when plasma treated hide samples where dyed with Eco- Mango Yellow (Combination of Punica granatum & Curcuma longa).