Selective separation of light rare-earth elements by supramolecular encapsulation and precipitation

Joseph G. O’connell-danes; Bryne T. Ngwenya; Carole A. Morrison; Jason B. Love

doi:10.1038/s41467-022-32178-3

Selective separation of light rare-earth elements by supramolecular encapsulation and precipitation

Joseph G. O’connell-danes, Bryne T. Ngwenya, Carole A. Morrison, Jason B. Love

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract / Description of output

Supramolecular chemical strategies for Rare Earth (RE) element separations are emerging which amplify the small changes in properties across the series to bias selectivity in extraction or precipitation. These advances are important as the REs are crucial to modern technologies yet their extraction, separation, and recycling using conventional techniques remain challenging. We report here a pre-organised triamidoarene platform which, under acidic, biphasic conditions, uniquely and selectively precipitates light RE nitratometalates as supramolecular capsules. The capsules exhibit both intra- and intermolecular hydrogen bonds that dictate selectivity, promote precipitation, and facilitate the straightforward release of the RE and recycling of the receptor. This work provides a self-assembly route to metal separations that exploits size and shape complementarity and has the potential to integrate into conventional processes due to its compatibility with acidic metal feed streams.

Original language	English
Article number	4497
Pages (from-to)	4497
Journal	Nature Communications
Volume	13
Issue number	1
Early online date	3 Aug 2022
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-022-32178-3
Publication status	Published - 3 Aug 2022

Keywords / Materials (for Non-textual outputs)

Capsules
Metals, Rare Earth
Recycling/methods

Access to Document

10.1038/s41467-022-32178-3Licence: Creative Commons: Attribution (CC-BY)

Connell Danes et al.
© The Author(s) 2022
Final published version, 1.02 MBLicence: Creative Commons: Attribution (CC-BY)

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-022-32178-3Licence: Creative Commons: Attribution (CC-BY)

Rare-earth precipitation by capsule formation
Ngwenya, B. (Creator), Love, J. (Creator), O'connell-danes, J. (Creator) & Morrison, C. (Creator), Edinburgh DataShare, 14 Jan 2023
DOI: 10.7488/ds/3419
Dataset

Cite this

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title = "Selective separation of light rare-earth elements by supramolecular encapsulation and precipitation",

abstract = "Supramolecular chemical strategies for Rare Earth (RE) element separations are emerging which amplify the small changes in properties across the series to bias selectivity in extraction or precipitation. These advances are important as the REs are crucial to modern technologies yet their extraction, separation, and recycling using conventional techniques remain challenging. We report here a pre-organised triamidoarene platform which, under acidic, biphasic conditions, uniquely and selectively precipitates light RE nitratometalates as supramolecular capsules. The capsules exhibit both intra- and intermolecular hydrogen bonds that dictate selectivity, promote precipitation, and facilitate the straightforward release of the RE and recycling of the receptor. This work provides a self-assembly route to metal separations that exploits size and shape complementarity and has the potential to integrate into conventional processes due to its compatibility with acidic metal feed streams.",

keywords = "Capsules, Metals, Rare Earth, Recycling/methods",

author = "O{\textquoteright}connell-danes, {Joseph G.} and Ngwenya, {Bryne T.} and Morrison, {Carole A.} and Love, {Jason B.}",

note = "Funding Information: This research was funded by the University of Edinburgh and the Natural Environment Research Council E4: Edinburgh Earth, Ecology and Environment Doctoral Training Partnership, grant number NE/S007407/1 (PhD studentship for J.O{\textquoteright}C.-D., received by J.B.L.). We thank the Edinburgh Computer and Data Facility (ECDF, C.A.M.) for access to high-performance computing. We are grateful for computational support from the UK Materials and Molecular Modelling Hub, which is partially funded by EPSRC (EP/PO20194 and EP/T022213, C.A.M.), for which access was obtained via the UKCP consortium and funded by EPRSC grant ref EP/P022561/1 (C.A.M.). We also thank Dr Caroline Kirk at the University of Edinburgh for recording and analysing the powder X-ray diffraction data and Dr Gary Nichol at the University of Edinburgh for his help with single-crystal X-ray crystallography. Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2022, The Author(s).",

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N1 - Funding Information: This research was funded by the University of Edinburgh and the Natural Environment Research Council E4: Edinburgh Earth, Ecology and Environment Doctoral Training Partnership, grant number NE/S007407/1 (PhD studentship for J.O’C.-D., received by J.B.L.). We thank the Edinburgh Computer and Data Facility (ECDF, C.A.M.) for access to high-performance computing. We are grateful for computational support from the UK Materials and Molecular Modelling Hub, which is partially funded by EPSRC (EP/PO20194 and EP/T022213, C.A.M.), for which access was obtained via the UKCP consortium and funded by EPRSC grant ref EP/P022561/1 (C.A.M.). We also thank Dr Caroline Kirk at the University of Edinburgh for recording and analysing the powder X-ray diffraction data and Dr Gary Nichol at the University of Edinburgh for his help with single-crystal X-ray crystallography. Publisher Copyright: © 2022, The Author(s).

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N2 - Supramolecular chemical strategies for Rare Earth (RE) element separations are emerging which amplify the small changes in properties across the series to bias selectivity in extraction or precipitation. These advances are important as the REs are crucial to modern technologies yet their extraction, separation, and recycling using conventional techniques remain challenging. We report here a pre-organised triamidoarene platform which, under acidic, biphasic conditions, uniquely and selectively precipitates light RE nitratometalates as supramolecular capsules. The capsules exhibit both intra- and intermolecular hydrogen bonds that dictate selectivity, promote precipitation, and facilitate the straightforward release of the RE and recycling of the receptor. This work provides a self-assembly route to metal separations that exploits size and shape complementarity and has the potential to integrate into conventional processes due to its compatibility with acidic metal feed streams.

AB - Supramolecular chemical strategies for Rare Earth (RE) element separations are emerging which amplify the small changes in properties across the series to bias selectivity in extraction or precipitation. These advances are important as the REs are crucial to modern technologies yet their extraction, separation, and recycling using conventional techniques remain challenging. We report here a pre-organised triamidoarene platform which, under acidic, biphasic conditions, uniquely and selectively precipitates light RE nitratometalates as supramolecular capsules. The capsules exhibit both intra- and intermolecular hydrogen bonds that dictate selectivity, promote precipitation, and facilitate the straightforward release of the RE and recycling of the receptor. This work provides a self-assembly route to metal separations that exploits size and shape complementarity and has the potential to integrate into conventional processes due to its compatibility with acidic metal feed streams.

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Selective separation of light rare-earth elements by supramolecular encapsulation and precipitation

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Keywords / Materials (for Non-textual outputs)

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Rare-earth precipitation by capsule formation

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