Selective Extraction of In(III) and Ga(III) Using N-Lauroylsarcosine (NLS)

In(III) and Ga(III) are included in zinc refining, the wastes of solar panel and electronics and so on. In solvent extraction which is a useful method of separation of metals, we used N -lauroylsarcosine (NLS), containing tertiary amine which is alkyl amide derivative with the sarcosine moiety in the molecule structure in order to separate and recover these metal ions. We studied about the extraction equilibria of these metals using NLS. The selective extraction order of NLS is Ga(III) > In(III) >> Zn(II). It was found that NLS was able to separate these metals by pH difference. Versatic acid 10 (VA10) with only carboxylic acid group in the molecule structure extracted In(III) and Ga(III) simultaneously in the same pH region. Therefore, we found that the amide group included in the molecule structure of NLS has an important role to extract these metals. Mutual separation of In(III), Ga(III) and Zn(II) was carried out by a one-step experiment using NLS. Slope analysis was used to investigate the extraction equilibria of In(III) and Ga(III) with NLS. Suitable concentrations of acids were able to strip these metals from the loaded organic phase.