Simultaneous preconcentration of uranium(VI) and thorium(IV) from aqueous solutions using a chelating calix[4]arene anchored chloromethylated polystyrene solid phase

A new chelating polymeric sorbent is developed using Merrifield chloromethylated resin anchored with calix[4]arene-o-vanillinsemicarbazone for simultaneous separation and solid phase extractive preconcentration of U(VI) and Th(IV). The “upper-rim” functionalized calix[4]arene-o-vanillinsemicarbazone was covalently linked to Merrifield resin and characterized by FT-IR and elemental analysis. The synthesized chelating polymeric sorbent shows superior binding affinity towards U(VI) and Th(IV) under selective pH conditions. Various physico-chemical parameters that influence the quantitative extraction of metal ions were optimized. The optimum pH range and flow rates for U(VI) and Th(IV) were 6.0–7.0 and 1.0–4.0 ml min−1 and 3.5–4.5 and 1.5–4.0 ml min−1, respectively. The total sorption capacity found for U(VI) and Th(IV) was 48734 and 41175 μg g−1, respectively. Interference studies carried out in the presence of diverse ions and electrolyte species showed quantitative analyte recovery (98–98.5%) with lower limits of detection, 6.14 and 4.29 μg l−1 and high preconcentration factors, 143 and 153 for U(VI) and Th(IV), respectively. The uptake and stripping of these metal ions on the resin were fast, indicating a better accessibility of the metal ions towards the chelating sites. The analytical applicability of the synthesized polymeric sorbent was tested with some synthetic mixtures for the separation of U(VI) and Th(IV) from each other and also from La(III), Cu(II) and Pb(II) by varying the pH and sequential acidic elution. The validity of the proposed method was checked by analyzing these metal ions in natural water samples, monazite sand and standard geological materials.