Potential Modulated Intercalation of Alkali Cations into Metal Hexacyanoferrate Coated Electrodes

Nickel hexacyanoferrate is a polynuclear inorganic ion intercalation material that loads (intercalates) and elutes (deintercalates) alkali cations from its structure when electrochemically reduced and oxidized, respectively. Nickel hexacyanoferrrate (NiHCF) is known to preferentially intercalate cesium over all other alkali cations, thus providing a basis for a separation scheme that can tackle DOE's radiocesium contamination problem. This program studied fundamental issues in alkalization intercalation and deintercalation in nickel hexacyanoferrate compounds, with the goal of (1) quantifying the ion exchange selectivity properties from cation mixtures, (2) enhancing ion exchange capacities, and (3) and understanding the electrochemically-switched ion exchange process (ESIX).