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research article

Persistence of the isotopic signature of pentavalent uranium in magnetite

Pan, Zezhen  
•
Roebbert, Yvonne
•
Beck, Aaron
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January 21, 2022
Environmental Science & Technology

Uranium isotopic signatures can be harnessed to monitor the reductive remediation of subsurface contamination or to reconstruct paleo-redox environments. However, the mechanistic underpinnings of the isotope fractionation associated with U reduction remain poorly understood. Here, we present a coprecipitation study, in which hexavalent U (U(VI)) was reduced during the synthesis of magnetite and pentavalent U (U(V)) was the dominant species. The measured δ238U values for unreduced U(VI) (∼−1.0‰), incorporated U (96   2% U(V), ∼−0.1‰), and extracted surface U (mostly U(IV), ∼0.3‰) suggested the preferential accumulation of the heavy isotope in reduced species. Upon exposure of the U-magnetite coprecipitate to air, U(V) was partially reoxidized to U(VI) with no significant change in the δ238U value. In contrast, anoxic amendment of a heavy isotope-doped U(VI) solution resulted in an increase in the δ238U of the incorporated U species over time, suggesting an exchange between incorporated and surface/aqueous U. Overall, the results support the presence of persistent U(V) with a light isotope signature and suggest that the mineral dynamics of iron oxides may allow overprinting of the isotopic signature of incorporated U species. This work furthers the understanding of the isotope fractionation of U associated with iron oxides in both modern and paleo-environments.

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Type
research article
DOI
10.1021/acs.est.1c06865
Author(s)
Pan, Zezhen  
Roebbert, Yvonne
Beck, Aaron
Bártová, Barbora  
Vitova, Tonya
Weyer, Stefan
Bernier-Latmani, Rizlan  
Date Issued

2022-01-21

Published in
Environmental Science & Technology
Volume

56

Issue

6

Start page

1753

End page

1762

Subjects

pentavalent uranium

•

isotope fractionation

•

uranium remediation

•

redox tracer

Editorial or Peer reviewed

REVIEWED

Written at

EPFL

EPFL units
EML  
RelationURL/DOI

IsSupplementedBy

https://infoscience.epfl.ch/record/299904

IsSupplementedBy

10.5281/zenodo.5535727
Available on Infoscience
January 23, 2022
Use this identifier to reference this record
https://infoscience.epfl.ch/handle/20.500.14299/184716
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