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Catalysis Communications
Short communication
a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t
Article history: Gold catalysts remain of great interest, but a high gold price presents a concern. Gold can be leached from gold
Received 15 February 2015 titania catalysts using alkaline cyanide solutions. The specic activity of gold for CO oxidation can thereby be in-
Received in revised form 4 April 2015 creased substantially, though the precise nature of the gold before and after treatment remains unclear. It seems
Accepted 6 April 2015
unlikely that leaching proceeds in a simple manner by selective dissolution of metallic gold particles. Rather it is
Available online 8 April 2015
likely that cyanide ions interact with gold centers in several ways and, in addition, alkali metal ions may also
Keywords:
modify activity.
Gold 2015 Published by Elsevier B.V.
Titania
Cyanide
Leaching
CO oxidation
Thrifting
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.catcom.2015.04.011
1566-7367/ 2015 Published by Elsevier B.V.
88 M.C. Raphulu, M.S. Scurrell / Catalysis Communications 67 (2015) 8789
by Moreau et al. [1]. It seems likely that a substantial part of the gold in
Au/TiO2 is of low or zero activity but that the partition of gold between
the active and less active states is an essentially constant so that a linear
relationship between Au content and activity is obtained. The water gas
shift system involving Au/CeO2 may well operate differently.
In conclusion, cyanide leaching can be used to thrift gold, at least in
the Autitania system for CO oxidation. Whether the approach can be
applied more generally requires more work. The interaction between
cyanide and gold catalysts shows promise for elucidating further the
structure and action of gold catalysts, including the much researched
question of gold speciation and the detailed nature of the active sites.
It seems likely that this quest will be fruitful if due recognition is given
to the chemistry of cyanide interaction with gold species and if very
careful characterization, probably using advanced spectroscopic
methods of fresh and leached samples is carried out in conjunction
with leaching work.
Fig. 3. Removal of gold from catalysts as a function of the KCN concentration used. Acknowledgments