X-Ray Tomography for Mineral Processing Technology - 3D Particle Characterization from Mine to Mill

摘要

A brief review of X-ray tomography for mineral processing is given with recent advances considered such as high-speed scanning and image analysis procedures to describe particle size, shape, and composition. With these new 3D characterization tools, applications in mineral processing are discussed for high resolution X-ray microtomography (HRXMT) laboratory analysis with a voxel resolution of ~1 micron including, 1) multiphase particle characterization by HRXMT and comparison with SEM, 2) particle damage state as a result of blasting/comminution, 3) liberation characterization to describe expected separation efficiency, 4) exposed grain surface area analysis to explain the flotation of locked particles, and 5) floe size, shape, and water content for polymer-induced flocculation.Finally applications in mineral processing for plant-site analysis using high speed X-ray computed tomography (HSXCT) are examined, including for example plant site coal washability analysis and the analysis of crusher plant products with scanning rates on the order of 1 kg/min.