{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,10,6]],"date-time":"2026-10-06T11:18:59Z","timestamp":1791285539538,"version":"4.1.0"},"reference-count":36,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"9","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2015,8,27]],"date-time":"2015-08-27T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1440633600000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["IJERPH"],"abstract":"<jats:p>Heavy metals constitute some of the most dangerous pollutants of  water, as they are toxic to humans, animals, and aquatic organisms.  These metals are considered to be of major public health concern and,  therefore, need to be removed. Adsorption is a common physico-chemical  process used to remove heavy metals. Dissolved organic carbon (DOC) and  suspended solids (SS) are associated pollutants in water systems that  can interact with heavy metals during the treatment process. The  interactions of DOC and SS during the removal of heavy metals by  granular activated carbon were investigated in batch and  fixed-bed  column experiments. Batch adsorption studies indicated that Langmuir  adsorption maxima for Pb, Cu, Zn, Cd, and Ni at pH 6.5 were 11.9, 11.8,  3.3, 2.0, and 1.8 mg\/g, respectively. With the addition of humic acid  (HA) (DOC representative), they were 7.5, 3.7, 3.2, 1.6, and 2.5 mg\/g,  respectively. In the column experiment, no breakthrough (complete  removal) was obtained for Pb and Cu, but adding HA provided a  breakthrough in removing these metals. For Zn, Cd and Ni, this  breakthrough occurred even without HA being added. Adding kaolinite  (representative of SS) had no effect on Pb and Cu, but it did on the  other metals.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/ijerph120910475","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2015,8,27]],"date-time":"2015-08-27T10:03:37Z","timestamp":1440669817000},"page":"10475-10489","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":56,"title":["Effects of Humic Acid and Suspended Solids on the Removal of Heavy Metals from Water by Adsorption onto Granular Activated Carbon"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"12","author":[{"given":"Danious","family":"Sounthararajah","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology, University of Technology, Sydney, NSW 2007, Australia"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Paripurnanda","family":"Loganathan","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology, University of Technology, Sydney, NSW 2007, Australia"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Jaya","family":"Kandasamy","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology, University of Technology, Sydney, NSW 2007, Australia"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-2434-7490","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Saravanamuthu","family":"Vigneswaran","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology, University of Technology, Sydney, NSW 2007, Australia"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2015,8,27]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"236","DOI":"10.1289\/ehp.95103236","article-title":"Environmental assault on immunity","volume":"103","year":"1995","journal-title":"Environ. 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