Treatment of model solutions and wastewater containing selected hazardous metal ions using a chitin/lignin hybrid material as an effective sorbent.

A chitin/lignin material with defined physicochemical and morphological properties was used as an effective adsorbent of environmentally toxic metals from model systems. Particularly significant is its use in the neutralization of real industrial wastes. The ions Ni, Cu, Zn and Pb were adsorbed on the functional sorbent, confirming the high sorption capacity of the newly obtained product, primarily due to the presence on its surface of numerous active functional groups from the component biopolymers.