Investigating the Mechanism of Diethylenetriamine Pentamethylene Phosphonic Acid as a Depressant for Calcite Flotation of Fluorite

Haijun Wu; Chenhu Zhang; Jing Zhang; Chengyong Wang; Peng Chen; Shiwei Wang

doi:10.1021/acsomega.3c10400

Investigating the Mechanism of Diethylenetriamine Pentamethylene Phosphonic Acid as a Depressant for Calcite Flotation of Fluorite

ACS Omega. 2024 Apr 8;9(15):17354-17367. doi: 10.1021/acsomega.3c10400. eCollection 2024 Apr 16.

Authors

Haijun Wu^{1

2}, Chenhu Zhang², Jing Zhang¹, Chengyong Wang², Peng Chen², Shiwei Wang²

Affiliations

¹ College of Environmental and Chemical Engineering, Dalian University, Dalian, Liaoning 116622, China.
² School of Mining and Mechanical Engineering, Liupanshui Normal University, Liupanshui, Guizhou 553004, China.

Abstract

Fluorite and calcite have been attracting research attention for a long time. This paper reports on an investigation of the use of diethylene triamine pentamethylphosphonic acid (DTPMPA) as a chelating inhibitor. DTPMPA was used as a chelating inhibitor to study the flotation, separation, and adsorption behaviors of fluorite and calcite minerals. The microflotation experiment showed that the maximum separation of fluorite and calcite can be achieved with a DTPMPA dosage of 1.5 × 10^-4 mol/L under weakly alkaline conditions (pH = 8). Zeta potential measurement, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy were used to confirm that DTPMPA was adsorbed on the surface of calcite, inhibiting NaOl adsorption. Additionally, density functional theory calculations showed that oxygen in the DTPMPA phosphate group formed the most stable bidentate binuclear adsorption configuration by chelating with calcium on the calcite surface. Through detection analysis and simulation calculations, the results showed that DTPMPA exhibited significantly weaker adsorption on fluorite compared to that on calcite, highlighting its selective inhibition ability on calcite.