2. Mix the ground rock with liquid. A liquid mixture is necessary to begin frothing to induce the separation of gold from other material. Adding liquid is the first step in the process, but a frothing agent must be added to cause the mixture to create a foam. Productive frothing agents are amyl alcohol, camphor, phenols, gas tar and even essential oils.
3. Add a collection agent to the frothing mixture. The collection agent bonds with the gold particle and forms an oily film that collects onto the air bubbles used for frothing. This technique is also known as flotation because the gold "floats" above the liquid. Productive agents belong to the n-alkanol chemical family and include include n-butanol, n-pentanol and n-hexanol.
4. Add organic chemicals to the mixture. These chemicals prevent other contaminants, originated in the rock ore, from adhering to the air bubbles. A productive organic chemical addition is carbon, to which the other contaminants will bond, leaving the gold to adhere onto the air bubbles.
5. Aerate the liquid solution and then separate froth from the water bath. The froth contains the gold particulates that will be further refined to remove impurities. The gold concentrate floats on top of the bath, but in a separate cell for easy collection.
The water bath is collected from the bottom of the flotation cell. After collection, cyanide can be added to further refine the gold to remove impurities, such as sulfides; or the gold concentrate can be heated in a smelter and the molten metal poured into molds for shipment.
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