GREEN MESOPOROUS CARBONACEOUS MATERIALS FOR THE SELECTIVE ADSORPTION AND RECOVERY OF CRITICAL METALS

摘要

Many industrial processes in today's world depend on the use of metals. They form essential constituents of catalysts, batteries and many high-tech applications (e.g. phones, computers, jewelry). This wide spectrum of applications is important and irreplaceable for everyday life. Therefore, it is vitally important to develop circular strategies allowing for the recovery and reuse of precious and/or rare metals, therewith ensuring their availability to future generations. One promising way is by adsorbing them from (aqueous) waste sources. To date however many commercial adsorbents are inefficient toward the specific adsorption of metals due to the presence of significant amounts of micropores. It is well known that the mechanism of adsorption in micropores is pore filling rather than surface coverage. So, only adsorption in mesopores can be controlled by surface functionality of materials. Herein, we present starch derived mesoporous materials (Starbon?) that are able to selectively reduced and adsorb and separate precious metals from mixtures containing earth abundant elements due to presence of specific functional groups on their surface.