Pretratamiento por microondas de menas refractarias auríferas con efecto preg-robbing: mecanismo electromagnético–térmico acoplado, modelado por superficie de respuesta y optimización multiobjetivo de la recuperación por cianuración
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https://doi.org/10.65093/aci.v17.n3.2026.62Palabras clave:
menas refractarias carbonosas, recuperación de oro, optimización multifísica, formulación mecanicistaResumen
El agotamiento de los depósitos de oro libre ha desplazado la producción hacia menas refractarias carbonosas, donde el carbón orgánico reabsorbe el complejo Au(CN)− (preg-robbing), limitando la recuperación por cianuración convencional al ~40%. Este trabajo reformula el desafío metalúrgico mediante un marco acoplado de multifísica y optimización, evaluando el pretratamiento con microondas para inducir microfracturamiento por estrés térmico en la matriz de sulfuros y pasivar térmicamente el carbón orgánico. Se caracterizaron dos menas representativas (MO-UG y STGO) mediante microscopía óptica y electrónica, difracción de rayos X, ensayo al fuego y absorción atómica. Las pruebas factoriales se analizaron con correlación de Spearman, modelos de superficie de respuesta, cinética de núcleo decreciente/Arrhenius, análisis de sensibilidad de Sobol y optimización de Pareto NSGA-II. La potencia se correlaciona con la densidad de grietas (ρ = 0.92), y la recuperación con las grietas (ρ = 0.74), la temperatura (ρ = 0.69) y el carbón orgánico (ρ = 0.57). Sobre 600 °C, la recuperación supera el 85%. El pretratamiento con microondas eleva la recuperación a 48 horas del 40% al 71.8%, reduce el consumo de cianuro y aumenta el procesamiento en un 33%.
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