Bio-sourced reagents for the flotation of minerals in the mining industry

矿业公司被迫开采更复杂、品位更低的矿体，同时遵守日益具有挑战性的环境法规。其中许多公司使用泡沫浮选来精选矿物。在这一过程中，通常会加入有毒化学物质来专门改变矿物表面的性质(主要是疏水性)。随着监管限制的增加(例如，安大略省正在考虑禁止黄原酸盐)，该行业可能面临死胡同，因为没有足够高效、低成本或环境友好的替代试剂。 此前已有研究表明，多肽可以选择性地结合矿物表面。因此，本项目旨在开发替代浮选生物试剂，其基础是：i)大规模筛选多肽文库；ii)将疏水/亲水功能整合到(I)中确定的选择性序列中，以利于矿物浮选；iii)构建表达系统，以最有效的方式呈现生物试剂，并最大限度地提高产量；iv)对生物过程进行建模和优化，以生产(i/ii)中选择/设计的最佳生物试剂。 这些分子将被开发用于金、银、铜、锌和镍硫化物浮选的特定过程。将特别强调分析和最大限度地减少生物试剂的生产成本，以便使其成为目前使用的有毒试剂的竞争替代品。这些新的生物药剂在矿山废水中相对容易处理，因此将大大减少矿物浮选过程对环境的影响。 在该项目结束时，采矿业将为工业和商业发展提供效率更高、环境足迹更小、成本更具竞争力的新型生物收集器。

Mining companies are forced to exploit ore bodies that are more complex and of lower grade, while complying with increasingly challenging environmental regulations. Many of those companies use froth flotation to concentrate mineral ores. In this process, often toxic chemicals are added to specifically alter mineral surface properties (mainly hydrophobicity). With increasing regulatory restrictions (for instance, Ontario contemplates the ban of xanthates), the industry could face a dead end with no alternative reagents that are sufficiently efficient, low cost or environment friendly. It has been previously shown that peptides could selectively bind mineral surfaces. This project therefore aims at the development of alternative flotation bio-reagents, based on i) large-scale screening of peptides libraries; ii) peptide mathematical modeling and in-silico optimization integrating hydrophobic/hydrophilic functions into selective sequences identified in (i), in order to favor mineral flotation; iii) constructing an expression system that will present the bio-reagents in the most effective way as well as maximize yield; iv) modeling and optimizing a bioprocess to produce the best bio-reagents selected/designed in (i/ii) at its maximum productivity. These molecules will be developed for the specific processes of gold, silver, copper, zinc and nickel sulfides flotation. Special emphasis will be put on the analysis and minimization of bio-reagent production costs in order for it to be a competitive alternative to the presently used, toxic reagents. These new bio-reagents will be relatively easy to treat in mine effluents and will therefore greatly reduce environmental impact of mineral flotation processes. At the end of this project, new bio-collectors with improved efficiency, smaller environment footprint and competitive costs will be available for industrial and commercial development by the mining industry.