Hydrophilicity/hydrophobicity Flotation

The structure-property relationship of flotation agents is determined by three factors related to structure bonding, hydrophilic-hydrophobic property and steric interactions. A number of quantitative criteria such as molecular orbital (MO) index, group electronegativity and hydrophilic-hydrophobic balance (HHB) has been used. 

There have been many investigations on surfactant foams, foam films. Plateau border, foam drainage and their physical chemistry. The application of these results to protein foams is only partly possible. Proteins are macromolecules, their adsorption is coupled with a change in conformation at the gas/liquid interface which is a slow process. It takes 15 to 20 h to obtain the equilibrium surface tension. The residence time of the protein molecules in a flotation column is too short to attain the equilibrium surface tension during this time. Therefore, the transport of proteins to the interface and their adsorption at the interface are dynamical processes which are far from equilibrium. Surfactants have well-defined hydrophilic and hydrophobic domains. Thus it is relatively easy to calculate their interaction with the interface. Protein molecules have several hydrophilic and hydrophobic domains, and their interaction with the interface depends on the hydrophilic/hydrophobic character of their surface... 

Froth flotation (qv) is a significant use of foam for physical separations. It is used to separate the more precious minerals from the waste rock extracted from mines. This method reHes on the different wetting properties typical for the different extracts. Usually, the waste rock is preferentially wet by water, whereas the more valuable minerals are typically hydrophobic. Thus the mixture of the two powders are immersed in water containing foam promoters. Also added are modifiers which help ensure that the surface of the waste rock is hydrophilic. Upon formation of a foam by bubbling air and by agitation, the waste rock remains in the water while the minerals go to the surface of the bubbles, and are entrapped in the foam. The foam rises, bringing... 

Surface properties such as the absorptional ability and the wettability of minerals are again of significant technical importance. On the wettability scale, as for example, minerals are classified as hydrophilic minerals (which are easily wetted by water) and hydrophobic minerals (which are not wetted by water). Hydrophobicity is very helpful in obtaining enrichment of ores by flotation. 

Figure 2.21 (A) Separation of hydrophobic from hydrophilic particles in flotation.

Bubbles with some of them attached with hydrophobic mineral particles shown in the rising mode. Hydrophilic mineral particles with minority presence of hydrophobic mineral particles (those lost chance for contact with bubbles) and bubbles attached with hydrophobic mineral particles (those got mechanically driven along with hydrophilic particles) shown in the descending mode. (B) Froth flotation air bubbles carry nonwetted particles upwards, while wetted mineral particles drown. 

Separation of milled solid materials is usually based on differences in their physical properties. Of the various techniques to obtain ore concentrates, those of froth flotation and agglomeration exploit differences in surface activities, which in many cases appear to involve the formation of complexes at the surface of the mineral particles. Separation by froth flotation (Figure 4) depends upon conversion of water-wetted (hydrophilic) solids to nonwetted (hydrophobic) ones which are transported in an oil-based froth leaving the undesired materials (gangue) in an aqueous slurry which is drawn off from the bottom of the separator. The selective conversion of the ore particles to hydrophobic materials involves the adsorption of compounds which are usually referred to as collectors. 4... 

The h-pH diagrams of surface oxidation of arsenopyrite and pyrite are shown in Fig. 2.16 and Fig. 2.17, respectively. Figure 2.16 shows that jBh-pH area of self-induced collectorless flotation of arsenopyrite is close to the area forming sulphur. The reactions producing elemental sulphur determine the lower limit potential of flotation. The reactions producing thiosulphate and other hydrophilic species define the upper limit of potential. In acid solutions arsenopyrite demonstrates wider potential region for collectorless flotation, but almost non-floatable in alkaline environment. It suggests that the hydrophobic entity is metastable elemental sulphur. However, in alkaline solutions, the presence of... 

The F h-pH diagram for jamesonite is given in Fig. 2.18. It may be seen from Fig. 2.18 that in acid and neutral solutions, the reactions producing elemental sulphur may render jamesonite surface hydrophobic and jamesonite shows good collectorless flotation. In alkaline solution, the hydrophilic species Fe, Pb ", HSb02, SbOj, are produced, the collectorless floatability of jamesonite becomes weaker, it may be attributed to the presence of Fe(OH)3 and Pb(OH)2 at the same time on the jamesonite surface. The relative amounts of hydrophobic sulphur and hydrophilic Fe(OH)3 and Pb(OH)2 perhaps determine the collectorless floatability of jamesonite. 

Diamond occurring in the blue ground of volcanic pipes as well as freshly pulverized diamond show hydrophobic behavior. This is used in its isolation by flotation. Diamond found in sediments is hydrophilic, however. According to Plaksin and Alekseev (154), hydrophobic diamond turns slowly hydrophilic on storing with exposure to air. Hofmann (155) reported that fine particle size diamond forms stable suspensions in dilute ammonia after treatment with calcium hypochlorite. It seems rather obvious that formation of surface oxides is responsible for the hydrophilic properties. 

The common gangue material quartz (silica) is naturally hydrophilic and can be easily separated in this way from hydrophobic materials such as talc, molybdenite, metal sulphides and some types of coal. Minerals which are hydrophilic can usually be made hydrophobic by adding surfactant (referred to as an activator ) to the solution which selectively adsorbs on the required grains. For example, cationic surfactants (e.g. CTAB) will adsorb onto most negatively charged surfaces whereas anionic surfactants (e.g. SDS) will not. Optimum flotation conditions are usually obtained by experiment using a model test cell called a Hallimond tube . In addition to activator compounds, frothers which are also surfactants are added to stabilize the foam produced at the top of the flotation chamber. Mixtures of non-ionic and ionic surfactant molecules make the best frothers. As examples of the remarkable efficiency of the process, only 45 g of collector and 35 g of frother are required to float 1 ton of quartz and only 30 g of collector will separate 3 tons of sulphide ore. 

Often the minerals we want to float are hydrophilic, and surfactants (called collectors ) are added, which, at a specific concentration, adsorb onto the particle surface, making it hydrophobic and hence floatable. In a mixture of hydrophilic minerals, optimum flotation will occur where one of the minerals adsorbs collector but the others do not. 

The flotation of minerals is based on different attachment forces of hydrophobized and hydrophilic mineral particles to a gas bubble. Hydrophobized mineral particles adher to gas bubbles and are carried to the surface of the mineral dispersion where they form a froth layer. A mineral is hydrophobized by the adsorption of a suitable surfactant on the surface of the mineral component to be flotated. The hydrophobicity of a mineral particle depends on the degree of occupation of its surface by surfactant molecules and their polar-apolar orientation in the adsorption layer. In a number of papers the relationship was analyzed between the adsorption density of the surfactant at the mineral-water interface and the flotability. However, most interpretations of adsorption and flotation measurements concern surfactant concentrations under their CMC. 

The flotation process is applied on a large scale in the concentration of a wide variety of the ores of copper, lead, zinc, cobalt, nickel, tin, molybdenum, antimony, etc., which can be in the form of oxides, silicates, sulfides, or carbonates. It is also used to concentrate the so-called non-metallic minerals that are required in the chemical industry, such as CaF2, BaS04, sulfur, Ca3(P03)2, coal, etc. Flotation relies upon the selective conversion of water-wetted (hydrophilic) solids to non-wetted (hydrophobic) ones. This enables the latter to be separated if they are allowed to contact air bubbles in a flotation froth. If the surface of the solids to be floated does not possess the requisite hydrophobic characteristic, it must be made to acquire the required hydrophobicity by the interaction with, and adsorption of, specific chemical compounds known as collectors. In separations from complex mineral mixtures, additions of various modifying agents may be required, such as depressants, which help to keep selected minerals hydrophilic, or activators, which are used to reinforce the action of the collector. Each of these functions will be discussed in relation to the coordination chemistry involved in the interactions between the mineral surface and the chemical compound. 

The dependency of maximum rate constants for the flotation of coal on the concentration of carboxyl and phenol surface groups is shown in Figure 6. Each data point corresponds to a different coal sample ( 5 ). At low concentration of the surface oxygen groups, the surface of coal is quite hydrophobic and the flotation rate is high. Increase in these surface groups makes the surface hydrophilic with resultant decrease in flotation rate. 

In carrier flotation, small-sized (several pm diameter) particles become attached to the surfaces of larger particles (perhaps 50 pm diameter, the carrier particles) [630]. The carrier particles attach to the air bubbles and the combined aggregates of small desired particles, carrier particles, and air bubbles float to form the froth. An example is the use of limestone particles as carriers in the flotation removal of fine iron and titanium oxide mineral impurities from kaolinite clays [630]. The use of a fatty acid collector makes the impurity oxide particles hydrophobic these then aggregate on the carrier particles. In a sense, the opposite of carrier flotation is slime coating, in which the flotation of coarse particles is decreased or prevented by coating their surfaces with fine hydrophilic particles (slimes). An example is the slime coating of fine fluorite particles onto galena particles [630],... 

One technology to be tested at the CCTF will be a microbubble flotation process developed by Bechtel National, Inc., of San Francisco. Microbubble flotation is a further development of conventional froth flotation of coal. Froth flotation is a physicochemical process that uses the difference in the surface properties of coal and its associated mineral impurities to effect a separation. An aqueous coal slurry is fed into an aerated tank, where the hydrophobic coal particles become attached to, and are buoyed to the surface by, finely dispersed air bubbles and are collected as a clean-coal-froth product. The mineral matter, being hydrophilic, is wetted by water and remains in suspension to be carried off as refuse. 

Mineral flotation is a method for selective separation of mineral components out of polymineral dispersions of ground ores in water (ca. 5-35 vol.% of the solid) by using dispersed gas (usually air) bubbles. The method consists in the different adhesion of hydrophobized and hydrophilic mineral particles to an air bubble. Hydrophobized mineral particles adhere to the air bubble and are carried out as a specifically lighter aggregate to the surface of the mineral dispersion where they form a foam (froth) layer. This foam, called concentrate, is mechanically removed (Fig. 1A). A mineral is hydrophobized by adsorption of a suitable surface-active compound (surfactant, collector) on the surface of the mineral component to be flotated. All other nonhydrophobized particles remain dispersed in the mixture (Fig. IB). 

Fig. 1. A Principle of flotation in a mechanical-type cell. The rotor and stator (which is here omitted for simplicity) keep the mineral particles and air bubbles in dispersion for adhesion. B Formation of hydrophobic and hydrophilic adsorption layer on solid in quartz-fluorite system...

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