Research Paper PREPARATION AND CHARACTERIZATION OF PLANT BASED LOW COST ADSORBENTS D.S. Malik 1 , C.K. Jain 2 and Anuj K. Yadav 1 1 Department of Zoology and Environmental Sciences, Gurukula Kangri Vishwavidyalaya, Haridwar (U.K.), India-249404 2 Environmental Hydrology Division, National Institute of Hydrology, Roorkee (U.K.), India-247667 3 Department of Zoology and Environmental Sciences, Gurukula Kangri Vishwavidyalaya, Haridwar (U.K.), India-249404 Abstract The objectives of present work based to prepare the plant based adsorbents from pine needle (PN) and lantana shoot (LS). The adsorbent prepared without any physical or chemical treatment. The mesh size 75-150 µm of different sieve was selected for both adsorbents. The physico-chemical parameters of adsorbents were pH, moisture content, ash content, bulk density and elemental analysis. The surface morphology of adsorbent surface was analyzed by Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM). The chemical composition of adsorbent was determined by Energy Dispersive X-ray Spectroscopy (EDX).The surface chemical nature of adsorbents was studied by Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR), which shows functional groups on adsorbents surface. The present research work indicated that both PS and LS adsorbents could be employed as low cost adsorbents in removal of toxic pollutants from water and wastewater. Key words: Characterization, low cost adsorbents, SEM-EDX, FTIR, plant biomass. INTRODUCTION Adsorption technique played a major role in treatment of various types of water and wastewater. Many wastewater treatment techniques are used worldwide for pollutant removal from aqueous solution such as reverse osmosis, coagulation, membrane filtration, ion exchange and adsorption. Among all techniques, adsorption is considered as most suitable process because of its simplicity and cost effective [1]. Adsorbents are widely applied in removal of organic pollutants from water and wastewater [2]. The most common adsorbent is activated carbons which contain properties like high porosity, large surface area, and high carbon content. Activated carbons are most used as water purified adsorbents in industrial and domestic sectors but they are not low cost hence, there is need to develop the low cost adsorbents derived from plant and agricultural biomass. The cost of Journal of Global Biosciences ISSN 2320-1355 Volume 4, Special Issue 1, 2015, pp. 1824-1829 Website: www.mutagens.co.in E-mail: submit@mutagens.co.in researchsubmission@hotmail.com