Preparation And Application of Water-Soluble Polymer-Metal Complexes

Abstract

A series of water-soluble polymers and derivatives with chelating groups has been prepared and investigated for the complex formation with various metals. The complexation of basis polymers, such as poly(ethyleneimine), poly(vinylamine), and poly(acrylic acid) as well as copolymers was carried out in homogeneous phase. Membrane filtration allowed continuous or discontinuous separation of the polymer chelates from metallic ions not bound to the polymer. The polymer complexes remained water-soluble independent of the chelated metal and the polymeric ligand. Studies on the dependency of the capacities of the polymers upon various parameters and methods for regenerating the polymeric ligands are described. The introduction of chelating groups, e.g. pyridine-2-aldimine, thiourea, iminodiacetic acid, 8-hydroxy quinoline, and hydroxyaniline, to the macromolecules by polymer-analogous reaction or by copolymerization improved significantly the selectivity for the metals cobalt, nickel, copper, cadmium, palladium, mercury, silver, gold, and platinum. By the use of membrane filtration in the preparation and application of water-soluble polymermetal complexes it is possible to recover metal ions from solutions in a short time and in homogeneous phase. © IUPAC