November 2, 2024

Extracting Pure Gold: Turning Electronic Waste into Treasure

Credit: Korea Institute of Science and TechnologyBreakthrough in Metal Recovery TechnologyIn this context, a group led by Dr. Jae-Woo Choi of the Water Resource Cycle Research Center at the Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST) announced that they have established a technology that can selectively recover high-purity gold from electrical and electronic waste including numerous metals utilizing fabric materials.Adsorbents for metal healing are usually granular in shape to increase adsorption performance based on high specific surface location, but they are hard to manage underwater, resulting in low healing rates and even secondary environmental pollution. (r) Recovery effectiveness of the ALPF for Au recovery in a low Ci range of 0.1-100 mg/L. The amine-containing polymer fiber has a considerably larger surface location, which can improve the adsorption performance of gold ions (Au) in waste by up to 2.5 times (from 576 mg/g to 1,462 mg/g) compared to the groups previously developed granular gold adsorption material.The developed fibrous adsorbent not only revealed a gold recovery effectiveness of more than 99.9% in solutions gotten by seeping real CPUs, however also achieved a gold healing performance close to 100% in a broad range of pH 1-4, which consists of most waste liquids.

Credit: Korea Institute of Science and TechnologyBreakthrough in Metal Recovery TechnologyIn this context, a group led by Dr. Jae-Woo Choi of the Water Resource Cycle Research Center at the Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST) announced that they have actually established a technology that can selectively recover high-purity gold from electronic and electrical waste including different metals using fabric materials.Adsorbents for metal healing are typically granular in shape to increase adsorption efficiency based on high specific surface area, but they are tough to control undersea, resulting in low recovery rates and even secondary environmental pollution. FESEM images of the ALPF surface after Au healing at pH of (b) 3, (c) 6, (d) 9, and (e) 12, revealing the Au( 0) particles on the ALPF surface. (r) Recovery efficiencies of the ALPF for Au recovery in a low Ci range of 0.1-100 mg/L. Credit: Korea Institute of Science and TechnologyEnhanced Gold Recovery TechniquesKIST scientists have actually chemically immobilized alkaline particles on the surface area of polyacrylonitrile (PANF) fibers to improve both molecular gold healing efficiency and structural stability. The amine-containing polymer fiber has a considerably larger surface area, which can improve the adsorption performance of gold ions (Au) in waste by up to 2.5 times (from 576 mg/g to 1,462 mg/g) compared to the groups previously established granular gold adsorption material.The established fibrous adsorbent not only revealed a gold recovery efficiency of more than 99.9% in options obtained by leaching real CPUs, but also achieved a gold healing effectiveness close to 100% in a broad variety of pH 1-4, which includes most lose liquids.