Rare earth elements3/28/2023 “Even in a very complex solution where less than 0.1% of the metals are rare earths-an exceedingly low amount-we successfully extracted and then separated a grouping of the lighter rare earths from a grouping of the heavier rare earths in one step. “We first demonstrated that the method is exceptionally good at separating the rare earth elements from other metals, which is essential when dealing with low grade sources that are a hodgepodge of metals to start with,” said Cotruvo. Even when a sample has very low amounts of the rare earth elements, this new procedure successfully extracts and separates heavy rare earth elements with high purity. By changing the conditions of the sample, for example by changing the acidity or adding ingredients called chelators, individual types of rare earth elements become unbound and can be collected. Then other metals are drained and removed. The new method relies on a protein called lanmodulin (LanM) that first binds to all the rare earth elements in the source. Low-grade sources of rare earth elements (REE), for example from industrial waste, typically contain many rare earth elements and other metals mixed together. By carefully changing the conditions in sequence, individual rare earth elements could be separated. Then, by changing the conditions, for example by changing the acidity or adding additional ingredients, the metals unbind from the protein and can be drained and collected. The protein then binds to the rare earth elements in the sample, which allows only the rare earths to be retained in the column and the remaining liquid drained off. The protein is first immobilized onto tiny beads within a column-a vertical tube commonly used in industrial processes-to which the liquid source material is added. A paper describing the process appears online October 8 in the journal ACS Central Science. The new method takes advantage of a bacterial protein called lanmodulin, previously discovered by the research team, that is almost a billion times better at binding to rare earth elements than to other metals. Furthermore, current methods for extraction and separation rely on harsh chemicals, are labor intensive, sometimes involve hundreds of steps, produce a high volume of waste, and are high cost. These sources are vast but considered “low grade,” because the rare earths are mixed with many other metals and the amount of rare earths present is too low for traditional processes to work well. currently imports most of the rare earth elements it needs, a new focus has been placed on establishing a domestic supply from unconventional sources, including industrial waste from burning coal and mining other metals as well as electronic waste from cell phones and many other materials. In this study, we demonstrate a promising new method using a natural protein that could be scaled up to extract and separate rare earth elements from low-grade sources, including industrial wastes.”īecause the U.S. “This includes improving the efficiency and alleviating the environmental burden of the extraction and separation processes for these metals. “In order to meet the increasing demand for rare earth elements for use in emerging clean energy technologies, we need to address several challenges in the supply chain,” said Joseph Cotruvo Jr., assistant professor and Louis Martarano Career Development Professor of Chemistry at Penn State, a member of Penn State’s Center for Critical Minerals, and co-corresponding authors of the study. A new method improves the extraction and separation of rare earth elements from unconventional sources, including industrial waste, such as the mine tailings pictured here, and electronic waste.
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