Four modified starches with selected charge characteristics including cationic starch(CAS),carboxymethyl starch(CMS),amphoteric starch(AMS) and soluble starch(SS) were investigated as depressants for diaspore in reverse flotation test using cationic collector(dodecylamine).Adsorption examination,Zeta potential measurement and Fourier transform infrared(FTIR) spectroscopy were used to clarify the role of the surface charge characteristics of starches in determining the adsorption behavior and depression performance as well as the mineral-starch interaction.Results show that the positively charged starches(CAS and AMS) display higher adsorption amounts and also better depression performance compared with the non-ionic(SS) and anionic starch(CMS),benefiting from the favorable electrostatic attraction with diaspore and also electrostatic repulsion with collector.FTIR spectroscopy proves the presence of hydrogen bonds and chemical complexation between mineral and starches in an integrated manner.
Carboxymethyl starchs（CMS） with low and high degrees of substitution（CMSL and CMSH in short,respectively） were employed as depressants of diaspore in cationic reverse flotation using dodecylamine（DDA） as collector.The effect of degree of substitution of CMS on its depression performance was examined and the interaction mode and behavior were investigated in a comparative manner.Micro-flotation test showed that CMSL exhibited better performance in depressing diaspore than CMSH in a broad pH range.The adsorption of CMS on diaspore was studied by adsorption test,zeta potential measurement,and atomic force microscopy.It was found that CMSH corresponds to lower adsorption amount,thinner adsorption layer,and more negative charge than CMSL,resulting from the more chelating sites brought by the high degree of substitution.The surface tension measurement and DDA adsorption test further revealed that CMSL/DDA system gives a better depressing performance benefiting from the trapping effect by enveloping some DDA molecules inside the loop chains,while CMSH/DDA system is likely considered a quasi-surfactant.
Microwave irradiation was employed to assist the synthesis of poly（amino-quinone） （PAQ） from p-benzoquinone and diamines in solid state. The effects of power, time, and pattern （continuously or intermittently） of microwave irradiation on yield and intrinsic viscosity of PAQs were studied. It is shown that the continuous microwave irradiation at a high power leads to rapid increase of yield and a sudden halt in polymerization afterwards, due to the subsequent loss of volatile reactants at a high reaction temperature. Alternatively, the high-power microwave irradiation is applicable to raising the yield if used intermittently. In contras4 the low-power microwave irradiation favours the way of continuous exposure to ensure sufficient heat for polymerization. In both cases of high and low power, the yield and intrinsic viscosity can be further promoted by prolonging the exposure time. It is found that under a preliminarily optimized condition of intermittent irradiation at 490 W with six sequences of 5 min irradiation followed by 5 rain interval, the yield and intrinsic viscosity of PAQ from p-benzoquinone and p-phenylene diamine can reach as high as 83% and 41.9 mL/g, respectively.
The chemical nature of the interaction of starch and dodecylamine （DDA）, which generally act as depressant and collector, respectively, in the reverse flotation of bauxite, was investigated using starch-iodine tests. The results obtained from the blue-value measurements for starch＋DDA＋iodine system indicate the formation of the inclusion complex for amylose-DDA system at low DDA concentration （〈2 retool/L）. However, it is less likely for amylopectin-DDA system with short helix. UV-Vis spectra of starch-iodine complexes show that each helix of amylose can accommodate two DDA molecules locating separately at its two ends, and in the helical cavity there is room available for the upcoming iodine. When concentrated DDA is tested, amylose-DDA system exhibits no characteristic starch-iodine color, owing to the presence of a compact coating of DDA molecules on starch via hydroxyl/amine hydrogen bonding. ^1H NMR spectroscopy and surface tension determination help to clarify the interaction mechanism of amylose with DDA.
