Link: Technology Review: Neutralizing Toxic Chromium with Sugar?.
Bryan Bilyeu, a chemist at Xavier University in New Orleans, has discovered that adding a fructose or glucose (sugar) solution to wastewater and soil converts from 93% to 94% of the highly toxic hexavalent chromium (chromium VI) into chromium III, a stable form that is a nutrient for cells. The technique may also work on other heavy metal contaminants. With his colleagues at the Universidad Autónoma del Estado de México in Toluca, Bilyeu is investigating how wastewater can be filtered through natural fibers such as orange peels and cactus to trap and remove the chromium III.
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