Separation and recovery of gold and copper by using a surfactant extraction method

An aqueous solution containing surfactants exhibits the property of being separated into two phases due to a temperature change or an addition of salts. The extraction and stripping of copper (II) and gold (III) as thiourea complexes were investigated between the anionic surfactant of sodium dodecylbenzene sulfonate (SDBS) and aqueous phases. The combination of extraction and stripping steps exploiting the nature of the separated surfactant phases seems to be a reasonable alternative to traditional extraction procedures being used organic solvents. At the 1.0x10^<-3> mol dm^<-3> the recoveries of copper (II) and gold (III) were 86% and 5.5%, respectively. This method was applied to recover the copper and gold from an electric connector of PC.