In this study, response surface methodology (RSM)? was employed to optimize the adsorption of 4-nitroaniline (4-NA) from? aqueous solution onto activated carbons obtained from peanut shells (PNAC) ?and avocado seed (ASAC). The samples were activated with 0.6 M KOH and were characterized using FTIR, XRD techniques. Different physical properties such as moisture content, pH, pHpzc and iodine number were also determined. Response surface methodology was used to study the interactive effect and to optimize the operational parameters on the adsorption capacity of 4-NA onto PNAC and ASAC. It was shown that a second order polynomial regression model properly interprets the experimental data with correlation coefficients of determination (R2) values of 97.17% and 95.68% for 4-NA adsorption on PNAC and ASAC respectively. Results also showed that the optimum conditions for the adsorption of 4-NA from aqueous solution onto PNAC and ASAC were as follows:? optimum initial 4-NA concentration of 50 mg/L, pH of 3 and contact time of 49.05 minutes onto PNAC and 65.5 minutes onto ASAC were obtained which resulted to an optimum adsorption capacity of 3.10 mg/g and 2.42 mg/g of 4-NA onto PNAC and ASAC respectively. The results obtained showed that peanut shell activated carbon exhibited a better performance than avocado seed activated carbon for the removal of 4-NA from aqueous media.

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