A Comparative Study of Anionic and Cationic Collector in Microbubble-Assisted Flotation for Coarse Quartz Particle: Performance and Adsorption

Recent studies have suggested that using microbubbles to assist in coarse particle flotation has some advantages. However, how the type of collector affects the recovery of coarse particles under microbubbles still needs to be clarified. This study compared the performance and adsorption characteristics of anionic (sodium oleate - NaOL) and cationic (dodecylamine - DDA) collector environments for microbubble-assisted flotation of coarse quartz particles. A two-factorial level and Box-Behnken techniques were used for statistical design for screening and characterizing the performance. The flotation process utilizing NaOL and DDA was not significantly affected by froth depth. In the presence and absence of microbubbles, the performance of DDA surpassed that of NaOL; therefore, the average recovery of the cationic collector was more than 10% higher than that of the anionic collector. Contact angle analysis revealed that NaOL measured approximately 70° while DDA measured around 90°. DDA was adsorbed more significantly than NaOL at the same collector concentration. Zeta potential was more sensitive to DDA; increasing both collector concentrations also increased the value of zeta potential. FT-IR and EDX analyses showed that DDA and NaOL were chemically adsorbed onto quartz. Overall, this study demonstrates that DDA outperformed NaOL in the presence and absence of microbubbles during the flotation of coarse quartz particles.