Title: Oxidation of antiepileptic drug oxcarbazepine stimulated by thermally activated persulfate

Authors: Changzheng Cui; Zhaorong Yang; Zhongxin Zhou; Wenhuan Cheng; Kuangfei Lin

Addresses: State Environmental Protection Key Laboratory of Environmental Risk Assessment and Control on Chemical Process, School of Resources and Environmental Engineering, East China University of Science and Technology, Shanghai 200237, China ' State Environmental Protection Key Laboratory of Environmental Risk Assessment and Control on Chemical Process, School of Resources and Environmental Engineering, East China University of Science and Technology, Shanghai 200237, China ' State Key Laboratory of Bioreactor Engineering, School of Bioengineering, East China University of Science and Technology, Shanghai 200237, China ' Shanghai Key Laboratory of New Drug Design, School of Pharmacy, East China University of Science and Technology, Shanghai, 200237, China ' State Environmental Protection Key Laboratory of Environmental Risk Assessment and Control on Chemical Process, School of Resources and Environmental Engineering, East China University of Science and Technology, Shanghai 200237, China

Abstract: Oxcarbazepine (OXC) is widely used nowadays due to its similar therapeutic effects of carbamazepine (CBZ) but with fewer side effects. The prescribed consumption of OXC has increased significantly in some countries, and its environmental pollutions have become a major concern. This paper firstly reported the degradation of OXC by heat-activated persulfate. Effects of temperature, dosage of persulfate and pH on the oxidation of OXC were examined. OXC degradation followed a pseudo-first-order decay model. The rate of OXC oxidation rose with the increase of persulfate (2.0 mM to 6.0 mM) and pH (5.0 to 9.0). OXC can be oxidised almost completely within 10 min by persulfate (4.0 mM, pH 9.0, 50°C). HO was the major active free radical, 9-oxo-9, 10-dihydroacridine-4-carbaldehyde and 9, 10-dihydroacridine-9-carbaldehyde were the major intermediates of OXC degradation by heat-activated persulfate. The heat-activated persulfate demonstrating high potential for the degradation of OXC, is a promising technique for its removal.

Keywords: heat activated persulfate; oxcarbazepine; OXC degradation; OXC removal; oxidation; antiepileptic drugs; epilepsy; environmental pollution.

DOI: 10.1504/IJETM.2014.064580

International Journal of Environmental Technology and Management, 2014 Vol.17 No.5, pp.418 - 429

Accepted: 06 Dec 2013
Published online: 11 Oct 2014 *

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