To clarify the heavy metal adsorption mechanism of nitrogen-doped magnetic carbon nanoparticles (N-MCNPs), adsorption capacity was investigated from the adsorption isotherms, kinetics and thermodynamics points of view. The obtained results showed that the equilibrium adsorption behavior of Cr(3+) ion onto the N-MCNPs can be applied to the Langmuir model and pseudo-second-order kinetics. It indicated that the fabricated N-MCNPs had the homogenous surface for adsorption and all adsorption sites had equal adsorption energies. Furthermore, the adsorption onto N-MCNPs taken place through a chemical process involving the valence forces. According to the thermodynamics, the adsorption process is spontaneous and endothermic in nature which means that the adsorption capacity increases with increasing temperature due to the enhanced mobility of adsorbate molecules. The effects of the solution pH and the species of heavy metal ion on the adsorption uptake were also studied. The synthesized N-MCNPs exhibited an enhanced adsorption capacity for the heavy metal ions due to the high surface area and large amount of nitrogen contents. Crown Copyright (C) 2011 Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.