Chemical modification of keratin using Schiff bases to prepare cation exchangers and study their adsorption activity

In this research, keratin was chemically modified by Grafting keratin with 4-nitro-aniline, and then a reducing reaction was carried out to reduce the nitro group in order to generate an aromatic amino group on keratin structure to be used in the preparation of Schiff bases. Four exchangers of Schiff bases then were synthesized by reacting five derivatives of benzaldehyde with the crafted keratin. The FTIR, DSC spectra of the prepared exchanges were recorded. The effectiveness of the compounds was tested in the adsorption of some heavy metal ions (copper and lead), as the compounds gave promising results by removing ions from their aqueous solutions in pH (6.5–7), the percentage of removal of copper and lead ions reached about 40%.