Isolation of Chitin from Shrimp Shells and Its Use in Biosorption of Heavy Metals

In this research work natural bio polymer ?chitosan? was extracted using locally available shrimp shells and absorption of copper by chitosan was studied. Synthesis of chitosan involved four main stages as preconditioning, demineralization, deproteinization and deacetylation. Chitosan was characterized using Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR). The affinity of chitosan for cupper was studied using anhydrous CuCl2 solution as the heavy metal solution containing Cu (II) ions.