Bio-recovery of CuS nanoparticles from the treatment of acid mine drainage with potential photocatalytic and antibacterial applications

Abstract

In the present work, CuS nanoparticles were biorecovered from a real acid mine drainage (AMD) and its photocatalytic and antibacterial activities were studied. CuS were formed by delivering biogenic H2S produced by a continuous sulfidogenic bioreactor to an off-line vessel containing the AMD. The main physico-chemical properties of CuS nanoparticles were analyzed by UV–vis spectroscopy, TEM, FE-SEM, XRD and XPS. Moreover, its photocatalytic activity on the photodegradation of organic dyes in water and its antibacterial activity against several bacterial strains were studied and compared with CuS nanoparticles synthetized from a CuSO4 aqueous solution based on the same synthesis method. CuS nanoparticles from the real AMD showed similar physico-chemical properties and photocatalytic and antibacterial activities in comparison to CuS nanoparticles formed with the copper solutions. These results open the way to recover valorous CuS nanoparticles from AMD with potential industrial applications using a metal bioremediation process based on sulfidogenic bioreactors.