Sorption Behavior of In(III) Ions onto Cation-Exchange Carboxylic Resin in Aqueous Solutions: Batch and Column Studies

摘要

Indium and its compounds have numerous industrial applications in the manufacture of liquid crystal displays and semiconductors. They are considered hazardous substances. This article reports the research into the recovery of In(III) from aqueous solution by sorption. Cation-exchange carboxylic resin (D155 resin) was used as a sorbent for indium(III) ions extraction in this research. The factors of parameters, such as pH, kinetics, temperature and sorption isotherm, and column experiment were investigated. In batch system, D155 resin exhibited the highest In(III) ion uptake as 279 mg/g at 298 K with a pH value 5.00. The sorption data matched the Langmuir isotherms very well. The thermodynamic parameter ΔG was negative, and this result indicated that the sorption of In(III) ions on D155 resin was spontaneous. Furthermore, the positive value of ΔH showed that the sorption was endothermic in nature. In(III) ions can be eluted with 0.5 mol/L HCl solution. The Thomas model was applied to experimental column data to determine the characteristic parameters of the column which is useful for process design.