The scarce metal platinum — a valuable catalyst — is hard to recycle if it is mixed with other noble metals such as gold, because the strong acids used to dissolve these metals do so indiscriminately. Wei Lin, Ching-Ping Wong and their colleagues at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta have come up with a solvent that can efficiently dissolve gold, palladium and silver at room temperature, but leaves platinum untouched.
Varying the composition of the solvent — a mixture of thionyl chloride and organic reagents — allows selective dissolution of metals. The system should help to recover platinum more efficiently from metal waste streams.
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Chemistry: Dissolving precious metals. Nature 467, 503 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1038/467503d
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/467503d