Study on Gas-Liquid Inclusions in Quartz Sand under Microwave Field

Abstract

The impurities and gas-liquid inclusions in quartz sand, which are from our country and UNIMIN Corporation respectively, were analyzed by Inductive Coupling Plasma Emission Spectrograph（ICP-AES）and Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FT-IR). The results showed that the biggest difference between them was the content of gas-liquid inclusions. Thus, in order to improve the quality of our country high purity quartz sand, development of new technology to remove gas-liquid inclusions has been imperative. Method for removal of gas-liquid inclusions, using microwave radiation, was studied in this project. Meanwhile, the change of microscopic morphology of gas-liquid inclusion was observed by polarizing microscope. And the change of water content in gas-liquid inclusion was investigated by Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy. Our results showed that micro-crack could be produced on the surface of gas-liquid inclusion under microwave treatment. The results also showed that new water molecules and liquid inclusions could be generated in the process. Furthermore, these liquid inclusions could be removed and H2O could be reduced by HF acid leaching.

Recent advances in the marketing, impurity characterization and purification of quartz

“…Therefore, inclusions containing Fe 2 O 3 can be thermally cleaved and removed more easily. Li et al used microwaves with selective heating characteristics to make tiny inclusions burst near the phase transition temperature, which produced cracks in α-quartz to β-quartz during the subsequent debinding process to reduce the diffusion of iron impurities [108] . Then, acid leaching treatment with ultrasonic was used to reduce the iron content in quartz to below 0.167 ppm.…”