Dynamic X-ray micro-CT insights of the recovery of ore bodies in presence of clay

Abstract

Clay minerals such as bentonite are widely present in various ore bodies, mainly as gangue minerals. For mining industries, the processing of those ore bodies is very challenging as the presence of clay results in poor flotation performance. The coating of the clay on the valuable ore minerals reduces the recovery of those minerals. The presence and addition of salt ions in water may have a significant effect on the slime coatings (Chen and Peng, 2018) and pulp rheology (Huang et al., 2020) enhancing for example chalcopyrite recovery (Jeldres et al., 2019).