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Published on: November 10, 2014
Coordination Environment Engineering of Titanium Spinel for Enhanced Lithium Recovery
Bing Zhao1, Wenfei Wei1, Yingjun Qiao1
1Key Laboratory of Comprehensive and Highly Efficient Utilization of Salt Lake Resources, Qinghai Provincial Key Laboratory of Resources and Chemistry of Salt Lakes, Qinghai Institute of Salt Lakes, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Xining, Qinghai 810008, P.R. China.
None:
Salt lake lithium extraction accounts for 35% of global Li2CO3 production, but current adsorbents are limited by single coordination environments. Here, we engineer the coordination environment of titanium spinel (H4-xLixTi5O12, HTO) by selectively exposing (110) and (111) crystal facets to modulate the tetrahedral and octahedral Li+ sites. The (111) facet exhibits high adsorption capacity (41.34 mg/g), while the (110) facet offers rapid kinetics (equilibrium in 10 min). Density functional theory (DFT) calculations, Raman spectroscopy, and 6/7Li solid-state NMR (ssNMR) spectroscopy reveal that tetrahedral sites lower dehydration energy and enhance mobility, while octahedral sites enable deeper diffusion and higher capacity. Coordination modulation thus enables a synergistic improvement in Li+ adsorption performance. This work highlights facet engineering as a strategy to enhance ion recovery and guide next-generation adsorbent design.
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