Sustainable recovery of ultrafine TiC powders from molten Ti-bearing slag under super-gravity field

Ultrafine TiC powders possess excellent physicochemical properties, which are mainly synthesized by using high-purity ultrafine Ti or TiO2 powders. In this study, a sustainable method for recovery of ultrafine TiC powders from molten Ti-bearing slag under super-gravity field was proposed. Firstly, the solid-liquid coexistence condition for single TiC powders in molten Ti-bearing slag was acquired. On this basis, the motion mechanism and separation behavior of TiC powders in the molten slag was studied. Under the force of super-gravity, all of TiC powders were efficiently separated from the molten slag along the super-gravity direction, and the Ti recovery ratio reached 96.69%. Moreover, the recovered TiC powders were confirmed to be high purity (w (Ti) = 79.49%) and ultrafine particles (particle size 2.75 μm on average). Compared with synthetic methods, this study provides a sustainable way to produce ultrafine TiC powders for clean utilization of massive Ti-bearing slag.