Team:Calgary/Metal Separation Overview
OVERVIEW
Electronic waste (E-waste) is a massively untapped source of Rare Earth Elements (REEs), with immense potential to help create a sustainable supply line. However, the biggest challenge facing REE recycling from e-waste is that e-waste contains a high concentration of impurities, making their purification extremely challenging. Traditional methods of REE recycling are not selective, requiring multiple complex chemical steps to purify the REEs against competing metals. As such, REE recycling has remained economically infeasible, which is why less than 1% of REEs are recovered from e-waste annually. To address this challenge and help unlock the potential of e-waste as a sustainable source of REEs, we have developed a selective and efficient method of REE purification using a novel lanthanide-binding protein, lanmodulin.
Wet Lab
At the heart of our REE purification system is Lanmodulin, a highly selective REE-binding protein with more than 100-million-fold affinity for REEs over other metals. With impressive thermostability, pH stability, and reaction kinetics, lanmodulin is a robust protein with applications to be an effective solution to the REE scarcity problem.
Modelling
While lanmodulin shows promise in the laboratory, we wanted to evaluate how it would perform in a packed adsorber column as a high throughput system. Through our modeling and simulation, we determined its viability and optimized the parameters to improve its performance.
Hardware
Conventional protein production in the lab does not lend itself to high protein yields in a short amount of time; on the other hand, commercial laboratory bioreactors are often inaccessible due to cost. So, we made a low-cost, affordable bioreactor that can be constructed using readily available materials in the laboratory.
