Selective heterogeneous capture and release of actinides using carborane-functionalized electrodes

Maxwell Mattejat; Gabriel Ménard

doi:10.1039/d3cc02135a

Selective heterogeneous capture and release of actinides using carborane-functionalized electrodes

Chem Commun (Camb). 2023 Aug 8;59(64):9710-9713. doi: 10.1039/d3cc02135a.

Authors

Maxwell Mattejat¹, Gabriel Ménard^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of California, Santa Barbara, California 93106, USA.
² Department of Chemistry, University of Calgary, 2500 University Drive NW, Calgary, Alberta T2N 1N4, Canada. gabriel.menard@ucalgary.ca.

PMID: 37470123
DOI: 10.1039/d3cc02135a

Abstract

We report the heterogenization of molecular, electrochemically switchable ortho-substituted carboranes (^POCb, ^POCb-Pyr) for selective metal capture. Films of ^POCb and ^POCb-Pyr on glassy carbon and carbon fiber (CF) electrodes demonstrated heterogeneous electrochemical behaviour that was enhanced by the inclusion of single-walled carbon nanotubes (CNTs). Galvanostatically charged CF|CNT|^POCb and CF|CNT|^POCb-Pyr electrodes selectively captured and released actinides (Th⁴⁺, UO₂²⁺) from mixed solutions containing alkali (Cs⁺), lanthanide (Nd³⁺, Sm³⁺) and actinide (Th⁴⁺, UO₂²⁺) metal ions.