A Selective Fragmentation (SELFRAG) device for liberating minerals, microfossils from rocks: more efficient, effective and safer for the UK community.

英国研究人员的高压材料破碎装置(商业上称为SELFRAG实验室)，可沿晶界有效地进行无尘样品破碎。NERC科学的很大一部分要求对从坚硬岩石中提取的材料(矿物、化石)进行分析。从岩石中提取的矿物或化石的质量直接影响从它们的分析中得出的数据。例如，对于U-Th/He热年代学，解释一种矿物的“冷却年龄”需要晶体几何知识，而对于其他过程(宇宙成因核素测年)，分离矿物的提纯会影响年龄的不确定性。因此，对于几乎所有的研究应用，完整的对象(而不是碎片)是非常可取的，而且通常是必需的。研究人员越来越多地从难以接近的地方获得样本，材料的数量有限。这适用于对偏远地区的探险，那里的物理限制和后勤限制了样本大小，以及在科学钻探中，材料的体积受到钻芯宽度的限制。在这些情况下，确保从较小体积的岩石样本中最大限度地回收高质量矿物或微化石真的很重要。通常，获取样本的成本可能高达数千英镑(考虑到一个钻芯的钻探和回收成本可能高达数十万英镑)。商用高压碎裂设备现已上市(SELFRAG)。这种设备比传统的粉碎和研磨过程有三大优势：(1)从岩石、完整晶体(而不是碎片)和微化石中释放出的材料质量更高，可以常规回收，从而加强后续分析和衍生科学(见下文)。社区的经验是，与常规粉碎/研磨相比，SELFRAG分离可以使样品可行；(2)处理时间更快-通过SELFRAG进行处理比传统粉碎和研磨快约6倍(30分钟比3小时，包括清洗时间)，从而显著提高工艺效率；(3)所需样本量更小-对于常规岩石，估计由于高质量矿物/微化石的产量更高，样本量可减少2至3倍。在样本量有限的情况下，这项研究变得越来越重要，例如，在偏远地区进行实地工作，或在处理科学钻探的样本时(例如，基于国际海洋发现计划的研究)；(4)有效地消除使用者接触粉尘和有害物质(例如，石棉、自然产生的放射性物质(NORAME))的“无尘”岩石破碎。样品的处理是在水中进行的--大大减少了对个人防护设备和/或与粉尘相关的提取的需求。英国的高压选择性粉碎设备(SELFRAG)将为整个研究界提供上述广泛的好处，提供更安全、更高效的工作方式，并提高从岩石中释放的材料的质量，这将直接改善后续分析。最后，这是一项相对较新的技术，新的创新仍在探索和开发中，例如，使用高压研究岩石破裂所需的能量，或使用高压破碎试验材料回收(即，什么是最有效的方法来粉碎iPhone并回收稀有元素供重复使用)。

High voltage material fragmentation device (commercially known as a SELFRAG lab) for effectively dust free sample fragmentation along grain boundaries, for UK researchers. A significant portion of NERC Science require the analyses of materials (minerals, fossils) that are extracted from solid rocks. The quality of the minerals or fossils extracted from the rocks directly impacts the data derived from their analyses. For example, for U-Th/He thermochronology, to interpret the 'cooling age' of a mineral requires knowledge of the crystals geometry, for other processes (cosmogenic nuclide dating) the puriting of the mineral separate that is dissolved to derive an exposure age, impacts the age uncertainty. Thus, for nearly all research applications, complete objects (as opposed to fragments) are highly preferable and often required. Increasingly, researchers are getting samples from difficult to access places and the amount of material is limited. This applies to expeditions to remote locations where physical limits and logistics limit sample size, and in scientific drilling where the volume of material is limited by the width of the drill core. In these cases, ensuring maximum recovery of high-quality minerals or microfossils from smaller volumes of rock sample is really important. Often the cost of obtaining samples can be many thousands of pounds (considering a single drill core can cost hundreds of thousands of pounds to drill, and recover). Commercial high-voltage fragmentation devices are now commercially available (SELFRAG). Such devices present three major advantages over conventional crushing and milling processes: (1) IMPROVED QUALITY OF MATERIALS liberated from rocks, whole crystals (as opposed to fragments) and microfossils can be routinely recovered enhancing subsequent analyses and derived science (see below). Experience in the community is that some rocks that SELFRAG separation can make the samples viable compared to non-viable with conventional crushing/milling;(2) FASTER PROCESSING TIMES - processing via SELFRAG vs. conventional crushing and milling is ~6x faster (30 minutes vs. 3 hours, including cleaning time) resulting in significant improvements in process efficiencies; (3) SMALLER SAMPLE VOLUMES REQUIRED - for regular rocks estimated that sample size can be reduced 2 to 3x due to the higher yields of high-quality mineral/micro-fossils. This is becoming increasingly important studies where sample size is limited, i.e., fieldwork in remote regions, or when working with samples from scientific drilling (e.g., International Ocean Discovery Program based research).; (4) 'Dust-free' fragmentation of rock effectively eliminating user exposure to dust and harmful substances (e.g., asbestos, naturally occurring radioactive materials (NORM)). Processing of samples is carried out in water - a much reduced need for personal protection equipment and/or extraction related to dust.A high-voltage selective fragmentation device (SELFRAG) for the UK would provide the broad benefits outlined above to an entire research community, providing safer and more efficient ways of working, and improved quality of materials liberated from rocks that will directly improve subsequent analyses. Finally, this is a relatively new technology and new innovations are still be explored and developed, for example using high-voltage to study the energy required for rock failure, or using high-voltage fragmentation to experiment with materials recycling (i.e., what is the most effective way to fragment an iPhone and recover the rare elements for re-use).