RESUMEN

The effect of phospholipid on the biogeochemistry of pyrite oxidation, which leads to acid mine drainage (AMD) chemistry in the environment, was investigated. Metagenomic analyses were carried out to understand how the microbial community structure, which developed during the oxidation of pyrite-containing coal mining overburden/waste rock (OWR), was affected by the presence of adsorbed phospholipid. Using columns packed with OWR (with and without lipid adsorption), the release of sulfate (SO4(2-)) and soluble iron (FeTot) was investigated. Exposure of lipid-free OWR to flowing pH-neutral water resulted in an acidic effluent with a pH range of 2-4.5 over a 3-year period. The average concentration of FeTot and SO4(2-) in the effluent was ≥20 and ≥30 mg/L, respectively. In contrast, in packed-column experiments where OWR was first treated with phospholipid, the effluent pH remained at ∼6.5 and the average concentrations of FeTot and SO4(2-) were ≤2 and l.6 mg/L, respectively. 16S rDNA metagenomic pyrosequencing analysis of the microbial communities associated with OWR samples revealed the development of AMD-like communities dominated by acidophilic sulfide-oxidizing bacteria on untreated OWR samples, but not on refuse pretreated with phospholipid.

Asunto(s)

RESUMEN

The structure and reactivity of 0-70mol% Al/Fe iron oxyhydroxides (ferrihydrite in the absence and presence of Al) toward gaseous CO2 were investigated with X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), atomic absorption (AA), scanning transmission electron microscopy with electron dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (STEM/EDS), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and attenuated total reflectance Fourier transform Infrared spectroscopy (ATR-FTIR) combined with density functional theory (DFT) calculations. Results showed that Al/Fe oxyhydroxide particles containing more than 20 mol% Al consisted at least in part of Fe-oxyhydroxide with incorporated Al and a discrete AlOOH phase. Results from ATR-FTIR experiments and DFT calculations suggested that the bicarbonate complex formed by passing CO2 over the particles was accommodated on at least three distinct binding sites. At the lowest Al concentrations bicarbonate was bound to individual sites with primarily Fe or Al character. At the highest concentrations of Al (>20 mol%) bicarbonate bound to discrete AlOOH phases became apparent. Results also suggested that the amount of CO2 adsorption for a given particle mass increased as the Al concentration was increased from 0 to 30%. This increase was likely due in large part to differences in the morphology of the particle aggregates that formed in the dry state, which would be expected to affect the amount of surface that was available to adsorb CO2.

RESUMEN

Periodic plane-wave density functional theory (DFT) and molecular cluster hybrid molecular orbital-DFT (MO-DFT) calculations were performed on models of phosphate surface complexes on the (100), (010), (001), (101), and (210) surfaces of α-FeOOH (goethite). Binding energies of monodentate and bidentate HPO(4)(2-) surface complexes were compared to H(2)PO(4)(-) outer-sphere complexes. Both the average potential energies from DFT molecular dynamics (DFT-MD) simulations and energy minimizations were used to estimate adsorption energies for each configuration. Molecular clusters were extracted from the energy-minimized structures of the periodic systems and subjected to energy reminimization and frequency analysis with MO-DFT. The modeled P-O and P---Fe distances were consistent with EXAFS data for the arsenate oxyanion that is an analog of phosphate, and the interatomic distances predicted by the clusters were similar to those of the periodic models. Calculated vibrational frequencies from these clusters were then correlated with observed infrared bands. Configurations that resulted in favorable adsorption energies were also found to produce theoretical vibrational frequencies that correlated well with experiment. The relative stability of monodentate versus bidentate configurations was a function of the goethite surface under consideration. Overall, our results show that phosphate adsorption onto goethite occurs as a variety of surface complexes depending on the habit of the mineral (i.e., surfaces present) and solution pH. Previous IR spectroscopic studies may have been difficult to interpret because the observed spectra averaged the structural properties of three or more configurations on any given sample with multiple surfaces.

Asunto(s)

RESUMEN

The reaction of ferrihydrite with gaseous CO(2) was investigated with attenuated total reflection Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (ATR-FTIR) and density functional theory (DFT) calculations. ATR-FTIR results show that CO(2) reacts with ferrihydrite resulting in surface adsorbed carbonate species. The carbonate species experimentally observed in view of theoretical calculations are shown to be in large part monodentate binuclear complexes. These carbonate complexes exist as both inner-sphere and outer-sphere hydrogen-bonded complexes. Under "dry" conditions CO(2) reacts with free OH sites on the ferrihydrite surface resulting in a metastable bent CO(2) (bicarbonate-like) complex. Removal of the gaseous reactant leads to the loss of this metastable surface complex. The reaction of CO(2) with hydrated ferrihydrite results in only carbonate formation (no bicarbonate). In this circumstance, experiments and theoretical calculations suggest that hydrogen bound water on surface OH sites prevents the formation of the metastable bicarbonate species. Ferrihydrite that was allowed to react with atmospheric levels of CO(2) and water vapor resulted in the formation of surface carbonate coordinated as both inner and outer-sphere complexes.