Abstract
Deltamethrin is a widely used insecticide that kills a wide variety of insects and ticks. Deltamethrin resistance develops as a result of intensive, repeated use, as well as increased environmental contamination and a negative impact on public health. Its negative impact on aquatic ecology and human health necessitated the development of a new technique for environmental remediation and wastewater treatment, such as the use of nanotechnology. The co-precipitation method was used to create Zn-Fe/LDH, Zn-AL-GA/LDH, and Fe-oxide nanoparticles (NPs), which were then characterized using XRD, FT-IR, FE-SEM, and HR-TEM. The kinetic study of adsorption test revealed that these NPs were effective at removing deltamethrin from wastewater. The larval packet test, which involved applying freshly adsorbed deltamethrin nanocomposites (48 hours after adsorption), and the comet assay test were used to confirm that deltamethrin had lost its acaricidal efficacy. The kinetics of the deltamethrin adsorption process was investigated using several kinetic models at pH 7, initial concentration of deltamethrin 40 ppm and temperature 25°C. Within the first 60 min, the results indicated efficient adsorption performance in deltamethrin removal, the maximum adsorption capacity was 27.56 mg/L, 17.60 mg/L, and 3.06 mg/L with the Zn-Al LDH/GA, Zn-Fe LDH, and Fe Oxide, respectively. On tick larvae, the results of the freshly adsorbed DNC bioassay revealed larval mortality. This suggests that deltamethrin's acaricidal activity is still active. However, applying DNCs to tick larvae 48 hours after adsorption had no lethal effect, indicating that deltamethrin had lost its acaricidal activity. The latter result corroborated the results of the adsorption test's kinetic study. Furthermore, the comet assay revealed that commercial deltamethrin caused 28.51% DNA damage in tick cells, which was significantly higher than any DNC. In conclusion, the NPs used play an important role in deltamethrin decontamination in water, resulting in reduced public health risk. As a result, these NPs could be used as a method of environmental remediation.