Removal of 185W, 99Mo and 125Sb radioisotopes from aqueous solutions using polyamine incorporated polysaccharides

Polyamino group-containing resins act both as chelating ion exchangers and weakly basic anion exchangers depending upon the species in contact in the solution. Ion exchangers based on polyamine incorporated polysaccharides (cellulose and galactomannan or guaran) have been used for removal of radioisotopes of 185W as WO42-, 99Mo as MoO42- and 125Sb and Sb3+ from their separate aqueous solutions. These chelating anion exchangers have been synthesized by reaction of polysaccharides with epichlorohydrin followed by the respective polyamines as nucleophiles in a strongly alkaline medium. WO42- and MoO42- are adsorbed from their aqueous solutions through anion exchange process by chloride from of cellulose-triethylenetetraamine (cellulose-trien), cellulose-tetraethylenepentaamine (cellulose tetren), guaran-triethylenetetraamine (guar-trien) and guar-tetraethylenepentaamine (guar-tetren) weakly basic anion exchangers. Guar-tetren chelating polymer has been found to be highly selective for 125Sb isotopes presumably due to the presence of chelating cis-hydroxy and tetren groups in the galactomannan matrix. (author) 11 refs.; 5 figs