environmental factors determining the trace-level sorption of.pdfVIP

Science of the Total Environment 345 (2005) 191– 205 /locate/scitotenv Environmental factors determining the trace-level sorption of silver and thallium to soils a,* a a b Astrid R. Jacobson , Murray B. McBride , Philippe Baveye , Tammo S. Steenhuis aDepartment of Crop and Soil Sciences, Cornell University, Bradfield Hall, Ithaca, NY 14853-1901, United States bDepartment of Biological and Environmental Engineering, Riley-Robb Hall, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853-5701, United States Received 22 March 2004; accepted 15 October 2004 Available online 18 January 2005 Abstract Silver (Ag) and thallium (Tl) are nonessential elements that can be highly toxic to a number of biota even when present in the environment at trace levels. In spite of that, the literature on the chemistry and fate of Ag and Tl in soils is extremely scanty. In that context, the key objective of this research was to compare the sorption characteristics of trace amounts of Ag and Tl on a range of soils and minerals. A second objective was to determine the extent to which the composition and surface chemistry of the sorbents, as well as other environmental factors (simulated acid rain application and the presence of competing ions like K+ + and NH ) influence the sorption and lability of Ag and Tl. To this end, short-term and long-term sorption isotherms were 4 generated under batch conditions for trace levels of Ag and Tl onto three illite-rich mineral soils from central New York (