Ruthenium compounds are highly toxic and carcinogenic. In the present study, clinoptilolite was used in the removal of Ru species from aqueous solutions. Clinoptilolite is a good choice of sorbents because it is naturally abundant and therefore cheap. After the process where Ru was removed from the aqueous solution, the clinoptilolite was characterized by X-ray diffraction, X-ray fluorescence, thermogravimetric analysis, and Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy techniques. The influence of pH, contact time, and temperature on the adsorption of Ru was investigated and the optimum conditions were found to be 2 h of contact time and pH = 2. Pseudo first-order, pseudo second-order, Elovich, and intra-particle diffusion models were used to analyze the adsorption-rate data. The pseudo second-order model was found to be the best kinetics model in terms of matching the experimental results obtained. Adsorption isotherms were constructed to assess the maximum adsorption capacity of clinoptilolite. The Langmuir model fitted the data reasonably well in terms of regression coefficients. Adsorption studies were also performed at different temperatures to calculate the thermodynamic parameters. The numerical value of ΔG0 decreased with increasing temperature, indicating that adsorption is favored at higher temperatures. The positive values of ΔH0 corresponded to the endothermic nature of the adsorption processes. The proposed method of removal is applicable at an industrial scale.

Two compounds have been studied by means of powder diffraction and their unit cell parameters are reported. The monoclinic cell parameters for dimethylgermanyl-bridged bis cyclopentadienyl tetracarbonyl diruthenium are a=11.03(2) Å, b=13.65(2) Å, c=11.609(2) Å, β=105.81(1)°, Z=4, space group P21/n (No. 14), Dx=2.135 mg/m3. The monoclinic cell parameters for λ-dimethylsilyl-dicyclopentadienyl-π, π′-tetracarbonyl diruthenium, are a=11.113(3) Å, b=13.60(1) Å, c=11.674(7) Å, and β=106.00(3)°, Z=4, space group P21/n (No. 14), and Dx=1.946 mg/m3. The cells found for the two compounds are in good agreement with those obtained from single crystal X-ray diffractometry.