Issue 39, 2019

Stability of europium(ii) in aqueous nitrate solutions

Abstract

In the lanthanide series, Eu3+ is most easily reduced to its divalent state. Reduction of Eu3+ has been studied extensively in aqueous media that are insensitive to reducing conditions. Recently, it has been reported that reduction of Eu3+ is also feasible in aqueous nitrate solutions and that Eu2+ remained sufficiently stable in these media to conduct separation experiments. However, additional fundamental research on the reduction efficiency of Eu3+ and stability of Eu2+ in these media has not been reported yet. In this paper, cyclic voltammetry, magnetic susceptibility measurements, UV-vis absorption spectroscopy and X-ray absorption near edge structure (XANES) spectroscopy were used to gain more insights into the reduction of Eu3+ in aqueous nitrate media. Within the parameters used in this work, near-quantitative reduction of Eu3+ could be achieved within 120 min in highly concentrated nitrate salt solutions, using both chemical and electrochemical reduction techniques. Moreover, Eu2+ was remarkably stable in these solutions, showing just a small percentage of back-oxidation after 5 h in a sealed measurement cell.

Graphical abstract: Stability of europium(ii) in aqueous nitrate solutions

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
01 8 2019
Accepted
05 9 2019
First published
05 9 2019

Dalton Trans., 2019,48, 14758-14768

Stability of europium(II) in aqueous nitrate solutions

M. Van de Voorde, B. Geboes, T. Vander Hoogerstraete, K. Van Hecke, T. Cardinaels and K. Binnemans, Dalton Trans., 2019, 48, 14758 DOI: 10.1039/C9DT03139A

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