Technological Metal Recycling Idea using Fish Sperm

1. Technological Metal Recycling Idea using Technological Metal Recycling Idea using Fish Sperm Fish Sperm A process developed by a Japanese team could perhaps be the key ingredient for extraction of technological metals. This process utilizes fish sperm to recycle and extract tech metals from things; such as electronic waste and magnets. This particular process involves the use of a delicacy in Japan – milt and salmon – the sperm of which is used to separate and recover several types of tech metals, and is applicable in numerous aqueous solutions. This has revolutionized the extraction process, making it a much cheaper and green alternative as compared to the traditional extraction method using chemicals. This is not the first time sea life or its DNA has been applied in uncommon ways. The strangest discoveries was the mass production of silver nanoparticles using fireproof coatings. of these Industries today, are more inclined towards using eco friendly methods instead of traditional metal extraction methods, to avoid damaging the environment. A fine example of this

2. initiative is the use of hydrometallurgy rather than pyrometallurgy, including bio-mining with the help of unique bacteria to recover various types of metals, and even extracting gold, using simple sugars. The Japanese team that discovered the process is based at the University of Tokyo and is being led by Yoshio Takahashi, along with the help of other institutions in Japan. The original study was regarding the absorption of tech metals on the surface of bacterial discovered the crucial role of phosphate site in binding the ions of these metals. This provided an incentive to study fish DNA that also has a phosphate site which can be used to extract technological metals. cells and Since DNA extracts are dissolvable, it needed to be attached to a solid substrate like cellulose. On the other hand, milt is in solid state and doesn’t dissolve. It is also easily available at a cheap price; the Japanese fishing industry discards thousands of tons of milt every year. The team then created a powdered form of milt and a solution as well that contained neodymium, and trivalent iron – the main metals that the neodymium magnets are composed off. They also created other referenced solutions. When the powdered form of milt was added to this particular solution, it was detected that the metal ions in the solution had considerable affinity towards for the phosphate in the milt powder. Tech subsequently recovered using the powdered form of milt along with the use of centrifugation and acid. dysprosium, metals where Jean-Claude Bünzli; an investigator of technological metals at the Swiss federal institute of technology, Lausanne; mentioned that the entire idea of using cheap milt glands in order to separate and absorb technological metals from the iron found in scrap magnets, is interesting. While the proposed standard operating procedure doesn’t suppress magnets dissolved in

3. strong acids, it still deserves attention. He also added that scaling up these operations using this technique could very well prove to be problematic, but it might be useful for removing tech metals in alloys, like printed circuit boards, hard disks, and cell phones. Yoshio Takahashi indeed recognizes that the recovery of tech metals from scraped magnets isn’t big business, but the salmon milt technique may very well be suited for recycling and extracting other elements on a sizable scale. However, the team has not yet revealed the effectiveness of the process on other elements. But Takahashi seems quite confident that capacity of ion-exchange in salmon milt is quite high. http://electio-invest.com/ae/ Contact US: Dubai, UAE Office #1702, One Business Bay First Al Khail Street Tel: +971 (0) 4447 0990 Fax: +971 (0) 4453 8811 info@electio-invest.com South Africa Unit 20, 1 Melrose Boulevard Melrose Arch, Johannesburg, 2193 PO Box 856, Melrose Arch, 2076 Tel: +27 (0)11 684 1747 Fax: +27 (0)11 684 1076 info@electio-invest.com Doha, Qatar Level 22, Tornada Tower Al Funduq Street, West Bay Tel: +974 4429 2554 info@electio-invest.com