Chromatographic Lithium Isotope Separation Using Cubic Antimonic Acid as Column‐Packing Material

Abstract

Ion‐exchange chromatographic lithium isotope separation was performed by using granular cubic antimonic acid as column packing material at 50°C. While the single‐stage separation factor for the lithium isotopes was 1.0020, independent of the flow rate, HETP was a monotonously increasing function of flow rate both in breakthrough and reverse breakthrough experiments. After 442 cm chromatographic development, the ⁶Li atomic fraction increased to 0.256 in the reverse breakthrough experiment and decreased to 0.026 in the breakthrough experiment both from its original value of 0.074.

The granular C‐SbA was kindly donated by Toagosei Chemical Industry Co. We acknowledge Professor M. Hosoe, the National Defense Academy, who measured the lithium isotopic ratios reported in this paper.

Keywords:

• Lithium
• Lithium isotopes
• Cubic antimonic acid
• Isotope separation

Notes

The granular C‐SbA was kindly donated by Toagosei Chemical Industry Co. We acknowledge Professor M. Hosoe, the National Defense Academy, who measured the lithium isotopic ratios reported in this paper.