By-product metals are technologically essential but have problematic supply.

ABSTRACT: The growth in technological innovation that has occurred over the past decades has, in part, been possible because an increasing number of metals of the periodic table are used to perform specialized functions. However, there have been increasing concerns regarding the reliability of supply of some of these metals. A main contributor to these concerns is the fact that many of these metals are recovered only as by-products from a limited number of geopolitically concentrated ore deposits, rendering their supplies unable to respond to rapid changes in demand. Companionality is the degree to which a metal is obtained largely or entirely as a by-product of one or more host metals from geologic ores. The dependence of companion metal availability on the production of the host metals introduces

SUBMITTER: Nassar NT 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4640630 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature