A wide range of neutral and acidic organophosphorous compounds and two nitrogen heterocycle compounds were evaluated as possible synergists for use with dithiophosphinic acid extractants developed at the Idaho National Laboratory. The synergistic interaction of bis-(o-trifluromethyphenyl)dithiophosphinic acid and tri-n-octylphosphine oxide (TOPO), butyl bis(2,4,4-trimethylpentyl)phosphinate (BuCy272), or dibutyl butylphosphonate (DBBP) has been confirmed by continuous variation experiments using trifluoromethylphenyl sulfone as diluent.. The solvent composition which yielded the highest value of DAm for each synergist was used to determine DAm, DEu, and a value of AmSEu from an aqueous phase containing 0.5 M HNO3. As expected, the highest values of DAm were obtained for solvents using TOPO as the synergist. However, the magnitude of the calculated separation factor increased from AmSEu = 40 for TOPO, AmSEu = 87 for DBBP, and AmSEu = 1900 for BuCy272.

Minor actinide separations using a combination of a dithiophosphinic acid and a synergist

249th National Meeting (2015)

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