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Mining for Gold and Copper using Biohydrometallurgy.
Member rating: No Rating | Words: | Submitted: Wed Jun 30 2004
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Mining for Gold and Copper using Biohydrometallurgy Biohydrometallurgy is an application in mining which uses biology to aid metallurgy (as the name suggests). In its natural state a metal such as copper is found combined with other elements in the mineral chalcopyrite1. A bacterium is then used to form the compound copper sulphate (CuSO4), which in turn can be treated chemically to obtain pure copper. This microbiological mining process is used only with low-grade ores and currently accounts for 10%2 of copper production worldwide. Copper can be extracted from its ores by using bacteria. This is done by, firstly the low-grade copper ore and also the tailings (left from an earlier traditional mine) are stacked up where the ground has been made impermeable. The ground is then sprayed with the acidic leaching solution (Thiobaccillus ferro oxidans and Thiobaccillus thio-oxidans 3). This solution is used because the bacteria used, thrive in acidic conditions...
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