News & Highlights
Research Highlight
Treatment of phosphoric acid sludge for economic recovery of rare earths
Research Highlight
Vital rare earth mineral monazite understanding achieved jointly through theory and experiment
Research Highlight
Synthesis of large monazite crystals
Research Highlight
Breakthrough in valorization of phosphoric acid sludge
Research Highlight
Fluoride control enables REE recovery from bastnaesite
Vyacheslav Bryantsev at Oak Ridge National Laboratory leads the CMI project "Critical material recovery from ores and lean sources"
Focus is on developing economical methods of recovery of rare earths (RE) from traditional/ nontraditional sources including ores, tailings, and processing streams leading to industry adoption of one or more CMI technologies and to expanded domestic sources of critical materials. Emphasis is on improving the economics of producing concentrates via design of selective collectors, improving state-of-the-art leaching efficiency, RE recovery from leachates, and separation of fine RE-containing solids from viscous liquids. Employed tools include supercomputing, laser spectroscopy, X-ray fluorescence, electron microscopy, and a range of separation equipment, such as flotation cells, leaching vessels, cyclones, centrifuges, filters, and extraction contactors.
CMI researcher Patrick Zhang, Florida Industrial and Phosphate Research (FIPR) Institute, Florida Polytechnic University, is planning a phosphate workshop for September 2023. More information available at this LINK.