Analyses of Levofloxacin Adsorption on Pretreated Barley Straw with Respect to Temperature: Kinetics, π–π Electron-Donor–Acceptor Interaction and Site Energy Distribution

Levofloxacin, representative of an important class of fluoroquinolone antibiotics, has been considered to be one of the emerging pollutants in various water sources. In this paper, adsorption of levofloxacin from artificial contaminated water was done by pretreated barley straw adsorbent obtained from raw barley straw after modification by H₃PO₄ impregnation and microwave heating. The adsorption kinetics was investigated at various temperatures and levofloxacin concentrations, and the activation energy was determined. In addition, site energy distribution of the pretreated barley straw for levofloxacin adsorption was estimated based on the equilibrium adsorption data. The average site energy and standard deviation of the distribution were determined and applied to analyze the interaction strength between the adsorbent and adsorbate, and adsorption site heterogeneity. The π-π electron-donor-acceptor interactions between the π* aromatic C═C of pretreated barley straw adsorbent and π* carbon atom in benzene ring attached to fluorine of levofloxacin was investigated by C K-edge X-ray absorption near-edge structure spectroscopy. The results and methodologies in this work could be transferrable to investigate extended systems of water treatment.