Ting Liao’s research while affiliated with Central South University and other places

Recovery of bismuth and arsenic from copper smelter flue dusts after copper and zinc extraction was carried out by a hydrometallurgical process. The dusts were leached with a H2SO4–NaCl solution and precipitating bismuth and arsenic in the liquor was performed. The precipitate was leached with a 2 M sodium hydroxide solution and the obtained residue and liquor were used for preparation of sponge bismuth and sodium arsenic, respectively. The process parameters were preliminarily optimized and under the optimal conditions, the total recoveries of bismuth and arsenic are 90% and 42%, respectively. The purity of obtained sponge bismuth can reach up to above 90% under the optimal conditions.

Preparation of lithium carbonate from spodumene concentrate was carried out by a sodium carbonate autoclave process. The effects of different operation conditions including liquid-to-solid ratio, Na/Li ratio, agitation speed, reaction temperature and reaction time on the lithium carbonate conversion efficiencies were initially investigated. The results show that the conversion efficiency is not less than 94% under the optimal conditions. The purity of the obtained lithium carbonate can reaches up to 99.6%, which is higher than that obtained by sulfuric acid method.