Stable U(IV) Complexes Form at High-Affinity Mineral Surface Sites

Uranium (U) poses a significant contamination hazard to soils, sediments, and groundwater due to its extensive use for energy production. Despite advances in modeling the risks of this toxic and radioactive element, lack of information about the mechanisms controlling U transport hinders further improvements, particularly in reducing environments where UIV predominates. Here we establish that mineral surfaces can stabilize the majority of U as adsorbed UIV species following reduction of UVI. Using X-ray absorption spectroscopy and electron imaging analysis, we find that at low surface loading, UIV forms inner-sphere complexes with two metal oxides, TiO2 (rutile) and Fe3O4 (magnetite) (at <1.3 U nm–2 and <0.037 U nm–2, respectively). The uraninite (UO2) form of UIV predominates only at higher surface loading. UIV–TiO2 complexes remain stable for at least 12 months, and UIV–Fe3O4 complexes remain stable for at least 4 months, under anoxic conditions. Adsorbed UIV results from UVI reduction by FeII or by the reduced electron shuttle AH2QDS, suggesting that both abiotic and biotic reduction pathways can produce stable UIV–mineral complexes in the subsurface. The observed control of high-affinity mineral surface sites on UIV speciation helps explain the presence of nonuraninite UIV in sediments and has important implications for U transport modeling

A proposed new type of arsenian pyrite: Composition, nanostructure and geological significance

This report describes a new form of arsenian pyrite, called As3+-pyrite, in which As substitutes for Fe [(Fe,As)S2], in contrast to the more common form of arsenian pyrite, As1--pyrite, in which As1- substitutes for S [Fe(As,S)2]. As3+-pyrite has been observed as colloformic overgrowths on As-free pyrite in a hydrothermal gold deposit at Yanacocha, Peru. XPS analyses of the As3+-pyrite confirm that As is present largely as As3+. EMPA analyses show that As3+-pyrite incorporates up to 3.05 at % of As and 0.53 at. %, 0.1 at. %, 0.27 at. %, 0.22 at. %, 0.08 at. % and 0.04 at. % of Pb, Au, Cu, Zn, Ni, and Co, respectively. Incorporation of As3+ in the pyrite could be written like: As3 + + y Au+ + 1 - y (□) ⇔ 2 Fe2 +; where Au+ and vacancy (□) help to maintain the excess charge. HRTEM observations reveal a sharp boundary between As-free pyrite and the first overgrowth of As3+-pyrite (20-40 nm thick) and co-linear lattice fringes indicating epitaxial growth of As3+-pyrite on As-free pyrite. Overgrowths of As3+-pyrite onto As-free pyrite can be divided into three groups on the basis of crystal size, 8-20 nm, 100-300 nm and 400-900 nm, and the smaller the crystal size the higher the concentration of toxic arsenic and trace metals. The Yanacocha deposit, in which As3+-pyrite was found, formed under relatively oxidizing conditions in which the dominant form of dissolved As in the stability field of pyrite is As3+; in contrast, reducing conditions are typical of most environments that host As1--pyrite. As3+-pyrite will likely be found in other oxidizing hydrothermal and diagenetic environments, including high-sulfidation epithermal deposits and shallow groundwater systems, where probably kinetically controlled formation of nanoscale crystals such as observed here would be a major control on incorporation and release of As3+ and toxic heavy metals in oxidizing natural systems

Synthesis and characterization of coffinite

Coffinite, USiO4, has been produced by hydrothermal synthesis. The synthesis products, coffinite nanoparticles (50 nm in size) with UO2 nanoparticles (a few nanometers), are always associated even if they are not always detected by XRD measurements. The formation of coffinite was shown to be very sensitive to several experimental parameters. The most important of these parameters are the pH, which must be in the range 8-9.5, the pressure, which must be below 50 bars, and the reaction conditions, which must be oxygen-free to maintain uranium in its tetravalent oxidation state. XRD and TEM reveal that tetragonal coffinite accounts for more than 90% of the final products while the by-products UO2 and a Si-rich amorphous phase are also present. The structural formula of the obtained coffinite is close to USiO4 as determined from EMPA (U0.99±0.06Si0.97±0.07O4) . XPS measurements show a peak chemical shift of the U-4f core levels by 1 eV toward higher binding energies in coffinite compared with stoichiometric UO2. The U-4f7/2 and U-4f5/2 positions in coffinite are found to be near 380.8 ± 0.3 eV and 391.7 ± 0.3 eV, respectively

Arsenic sequestration by organic sulphur in peat

Wetlands cover more than 6% of the global ice-free land area, and have been recognized as important sinks for arsenic. Wetland soils and sediments are subject to frequent changes in redox conditions, driven by fluctuations in the water table and shifts in biological activity. Under oxic conditions, natural organic matter promotes arsenic release from metal-(hydr)oxides, thereby enhancing arsenic mobility. Under strongly reducing conditions, however, organic matter triggers the formation of arsenic-sequestering sulphides, leading to a reduction in arsenic mobility. Furthermore, the sorption of arsenic to natural organic matter is increasingly thought to suppress arsenic mobility, but the binding mechanisms have remained elusive. Here we use X-ray absorption spectroscopy to analyse the speciation of solid-phase arsenic in peat samples collected from a naturally arsenic-enriched peatland in Switzerland. We show that natural organic matter can completely sequester arsenic through the formation of covalent bonds between trivalent arsenic and organic sulphur groups, which have an average arsenic–sulphur bond distance of 2.26 Å. We suggest that by binding arsenic in this way, natural organic matter plays an active role in arsenic immobilization in sulphur-enriched, anoxic wetlands