New Approach to Quartz Coarse Particles Flotation Using Nanobubbles, with Emphasis on the Bubble Size Distribution

Abstract

This study investigates the influence of bubble size distribution and operational parameters on the flotation behavior of quartz coarse particles. The parameters evaluated during this study include the different bubble size distribution, air flow rate and impeller speed. Experiments were conducted at three different bubble sizes: 110, 171 and 293[Formula: see text]nm as db(32). Then, the results were compared with common air bubbles of the conventional flotation process. The bubble size distribution was measured using a laser particle size analyzer (LPSA). Results showed that the recovery of [Formula: see text]m particles increased in presence of nano bubbles (NBs) up to 25% compared to the conventional flotation. The maximum recovery of 95.59% was obtained using NBs size of 171[Formula: see text]nm at the impeller speed of 900[Formula: see text]rpm and air flow rate of 30[Formula: see text]l/h. It was also indicated that NBs caused an increasing in flotation recovery for all the samples in any size ranges in comparison with the conventional method.