EN
Musa paradisiaca char was subjected to acid and alkaline treatment in order to prepare highly porous and efficient adsorbents. Prepared adsorbents were subjected to various characterizations viz surface morphology using a scanning electron microscopic (SEM), surface functional group using the Fourier transformed infrared spectroscopic (FTIR) analysis, and Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) surface area among others. Adsorbents were subsequently used for the uptake of Rhodamine B (RhB) from aqueous solution, and adsorption data were tested with isothermal and kinetics models. BET surface area of 985 m²/g was obtained for alkaline-treated Musa paradisiaca. SEM revealed large pores on treated biomass and functional groups analysis revealed functional groups suitable for sorption. The prepared adsorbents were found to be effective in the uptake of Rhodamine B, with more than 90% removal in some cases. Maximum adsorption was obtained at pH 4 for both adsorbents. Equilibrium adsorption data fitted best into the Langmuir adsorption isotherm with maximum monolayer adsorption capacity of 7.003 mg/g and 6.878 mg/g for acid-treated biomass and alkaline-treated biomass, respectively. Pseudo second-order kinetics best described the adsorption kinetic data of the two adsorption systems.