An international team of scientists has helped unravel the long-standing mystery of how deposits are rarer than Earth’s – and sometimes disappear without being discovered.
Rare Earth Elements (REE) is a set of 17 precious chemical elements that are vitally important in the manufacture of technological devices, from smartphones to disk drives, wind turbines, satellites, electric vehicles, medical devices and more. .
Although their names indicate that they are rare, in fact they may be relatively abundant in the earth’s crust; Their scattering makes it difficult to extrude and extrude from below the surface, leaving the environment favorable.
Because of this, concentrated REE deposits are a very natural resource, and scientists are constantly looking for new and better ways to find and preserve valuable minerals.
In a new study led by geologist Michael Annenberg of the Australian Australian National University, researchers wanted to explore the chemical mechanisms by which REE forms under and around igneous carbonate rock, closely related to the elements.
“These rare rocks and their altered and woven derivatives provide most of the world’s REEs,” the researchers said in their new paper.
“No unified model understands all the features of carbonate related REE deposits required to secure future supply.”
To investigate the mineralization processes behind carbonate-related REE deposits, En Neberg and his team simulated what happens when carbonate heats rock rock under greater pressure, before cooling and inertia in natural magmatic processes.
By placing small amounts of synthetic carbonatite in silver or nickel capsules in a piston-cylinder device, the researchers kept the samples at a temperature of 1,200 ° C (2,192 પહેલા F) before slowly decomposing and at pressures of up to 2.5 gigapascals (GPA). Cool them to 200 ° C (392 ° F) and 0.2 GPa.
“The objective was to understand what the focus is on the localized deposition of grades from the whole carbonate body.” Annanberg explained on his Twitter account.
“So we decided to put carbonate in a capsule and test it ourselves.”
Previously, it was thought that certain ligands – molecules capable of binding to REE, including chlorine and fluorine – were needed to make REE soluble, capable of reacting chemicals to crystallized concentrations.
But that’s not what the experiment showed. Instead, the results suggest that alkaline chemicals are required to transport REE around carbonates as a precursor to economic-grade mineralization, with experiments showing that sodium and potassium help make REE soluble.
According to the researchers, alkali-bearing carbonates are capable of forming REE-enriched liquids that can transfer long distances in magmatic-like conditions, while maintaining high REE solubility.
Of course, as we have seen in this laboratory condition, it does not mean that we will observe the same specific reactions in open systems of nature, which may include the presence of water and all other types of chemicals in the environment. Change things.
However, it is one step ahead, and that overhauls our knowledge on the background processes involved in REE formation and concentration.
Francis Vossall, a senior author and geologist at the University of Exeter, explains, “This is a magnificent solution that helps us better understand where ‘heavy’ rare earths like dysprosium and ‘light’ rare earths like neodymium can penetrate into the center of carbonite and its surroundings.” Is. ” UK.
“We were always looking for evidence of chloride bearing solutions, but failed to find them. These results give us new ideas.”
These findings are reported Science progress.
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