Franny S.

asked • 12/08/22

INORGANIC CHEMISTRY

You have an aqueous sample that contains V2+, K+, Hg2+ and Ni2+ ions. Using (relatively) common anions and/or ligands, propose a method to separate these ions. You are not simply trying to identify which ions are present, you must separate them so that at the end of your sequence, you have four separate containers which each contain a different metal. (For simplicity sake, assume that if you find a way to remove one metal by precipitation it will be completely removed from the solution without carrying along any of the other metals.)

Stanton D.

Franny, this is a standard sort of "wet chemistry" problem. Even if you can't find suggestions for all *these* 4 ions together on the Web, you can search for separations of various pairs of ions, and then assemble your information into an overall scheme. You may wish to actually calculate the residual solution levels of each ion, as you sequentially precipitate them (use the Ksp or K(complex) to calculate). Note that a wet chemistry type separation won't work for indefinitely low concentration of ions, so assume something reasonable, like 0.1M for each initially.
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12/31/22

1 Expert Answer

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Sheikh A. answered • 12/31/22

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Methods of Ion Separation


Add sodium hydroxide(NaOH) to extract V2+ as sodium vanadate: Na3V03.


Add hydrochloric acid(HCL) to the solution to precipitate Hg2+ as mercuric chloride: HgCl2.


add ammonium chloride (NH4Cl) to extract Ni2+ as nickel ammonium chloride: Ni(NH4)2Cl2.


Finally, add sodium sulfate(Na2So4) to the solution to release K+ as potassium sulfate: K2SO4.

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Yongmao S.

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_ Vanadium (II) or (III)? _ Added hydroxide in step 1 may interfere with mercury (II) _ was the charge of nickel in Ni(NH4)2Cl2 zero (0) or was there a typo? _ potassium ion is always in solution against added hydroxide, sulfate or chloride. Apparently, all four metal cations are in a homogeneous mixture (aka solution)
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12/31/22

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