Homogeneous hydrolysis of thorium by thermal decomposition of urea

Tadeáš Wangle, Václav Tyrpekl, Thierry Delloye, Olivier Larcher, Janne Pakarinen, Thomas Cardinaels, Jozef Vleugels, Marc Verwerft

    Research outputpeer-review

    Abstract

    Thorium was precipitated homogeneously from a thorium nitrate solution by the thermal decomposition products of urea. The kinetics of the hydrolysis were studied at 90 and 100 °C by pH measurement during the initial 5 h and the precipitation efficiencies of thorium and radium were measured over a 24 h period. Precipitation of the radium daughters was closely followed with the aim of co-precipitation of radium with thorium. The CO2 formed during urea decomposition dissolved in the solution, forming CO3 2− during the experiment upon reaching a sufficiently high pH level (>7). This allowed radium to co-precipitate partially, thus reducing the activity of the filtrate. After filtration or centrifugation, the precipitate is composed of nanocrystalline thorium dioxide (crystallite size ~10 nm), with weakly bound H2O and CO2.
    Original languageEnglish
    Pages (from-to)645-653
    Number of pages9
    JournalRadiochimica Acta
    Volume106
    Issue number8
    DOIs
    StatePublished - 29 Mar 2018

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