Determination of uranium and thorium content in the various stages of monazite upgrading

Characterization of the electrical behaviour of rare earth elements during the upgrading of monazite

“…Five of them were black sand (ore samples), whereas the other 14 samples were extracted from separation stages such as gravitational (four samples), magnetic (four samples), electrostatic (three samples) and chemical or cakes with REEs (three samples). Uranium and thorium cake samples were excluded because they contain trace amounts of REEs [15,16] also; their electrical properties have been studied elsewhere [2]. The samples were put into an oven at 343 K for 2 h to minimize the humidity.…”

“…The extremely unusual physical properties of REEs are the reason for a number of applications where no other element can suffice. One of the most important sources of REEs is black sand ore, which is composed mainly of ilmenite, magnetite, zircon, rutile, garnet and monazite [2]. Monazite has been found to be particularly important in terms of its industrial exploitation.…”

“…In order to obtain concentrated monazite, ore samples have been exposed to different stages of upgrading. Gravitational (tabling), magnetic and electrostatic physical separation stages [2] were applied on black sand ore to get a high concentration of REEs. Electrostatic separation plays the most important role in the final purification of monazite to realize high concentration of REEs [4].…”

“…During this study, a trial was carried out to shed further light on the characterization of the electrical behaviour of minerals rich in REEs. The identification of dc conductivity provides a quantifiable explanation of the behaviour of REEs during the electrostatic separation stage [2]. Moreover, the determination of the dielectric parameters (dielectric constant and loss, polarization, relaxation time and resonance frequency) can specify this behaviour [9][10][11][12][13][14].…”

Separation and preconcentration of La from monazite, followed by determination using nondestructive γ-ray spectrometry

“…The major components of this mineral are La 2 O 3 (33.95%), Ce 2 O 3 (17.10%), ThO 2 (5.5%), Nd 2 O 3 (26.68%), and U 3 O 8 (0.52%) [1][2][3]. According to other data [4,5], Egyptian monazite contains 64.00% REE oxides, 6.04% ThO 2 , and 0.48% U 3 O 8 . REEs find growing use as fine chemicals in modern industry (metallurgy, oil refinery, glass, ceramics, electronics, nuclear engineering) and in high-tech applications (semiconductors, superconductors, optics, lasers) [6].…”