Esta dissertação está baseada no trabalho desenvolvido para adequar a usina de Conceição 1 (da Vale S.A.) para o processamento de itabiritos compactos e semi compactos, situada em Itabira-MG. Até 2014, a usina de Conceição 1 foi alimentada com hematitas e itabiritos friáveis e produzia cerca de 22 Mt/ano. Com o consumo progressivo das reservas de minérios friáveis, tornou-se necessário que a usina processasse minérios mais competentes e com menor teor de Fe: itabiritos compactos e semi compactos (40%Fe). Até então, este material era considerado estéril, uma vez que os circuitos de beneficiamento não possuíam capacidade para transformá-lo em concentrados, tendo em vista às exigências de mercado. Portanto, o principal objetivo deste trabalho foi analisar o processo de ramp-up para aumentar a capacidade de alimentação da planta para 34 Mt/ano. O dimensionamento dos equipamentos, desenho dos circuitos, bem como as premissas adotadas durante o projeto de adequação serão apresentados neste estudo. Comparando a curvas de ramp-up prevista à praticada, notou-se que houve perdas mássicas consideráveis. Dentre os principais fatores responsáveis, está a grande quantidade de materiais compactos alimentados à usina com granulometria e, talvez, dureza maior do que poderia ser previsto. Os teores de ferro na alimentação da flotação e a qualidade dos concentrados (sínter feed e pellet feed) mostraram-se um pouco abaixo, também, do previsto, porém satisfatórios A estratégia de divisão por fases teve forte impacto positivo, evitando perdas maiores, pois reduziu o número de dias de parada consideravelmente. O desenvolvimento do projeto, denominado FRAGCOM (fragmentação e cominuição), pode ter ajudado a revelar as soluções para os problemas encontrados: este visou a obter melhorias no processo de desmonte e, consequentemente, na cominuição. Os resultados analisados de alguns testes deste projeto mostraram que, na britagem, a usina atingiu maiores taxas de produtividade nesta ocasião. Dado que a britagem é o primeiro circuito de processamento (um gargalo), isto é um fator relevante. Para estes testes foi utilizada uma razão de carga maior no desmonte. Com esta e outras melhorias, uma maior quantidade de material compacto pôde ser processado. Por fim, os resultados mostraram que a falta de aderência da curva de produção prevista com respeito à praticada, deveu-se entre outros fatores, à maior dificuldade de alimentação do circuito de moagem, impactado pelo baixo rendimento operacional da britagem. / This dissertation is based on the work developed to adapt the plant of Conceição 1 (Vale S.A.) to the processing of compact and semicompact itabirites, located in Itabira-MG, southeastern Brazil. Conceição 1 plant was fed with friable hematite and itabirite and produced 22 Mt/year) until 2014. With the progressive consumption of friable ore reserves, it became necessary to process more competent and lower grade ores: compact and semicompact itabirites. Until then, this material was considered waste, since the beneficiation circuits did not have the capacity to transform it into concentrates, especially regarding market requirements. Therefore, the main objective of this work was to analyze the ramp up process in order to fed 34Mt/year. The adopted strategies and their impacts on ramp up process to achieve the production rate were analyzed. Equipment scaling, circuit design, as well as, premises and tests, which were performed during the adaptation project, are presented in this study. Comparing the planned ramp-up curve to the implemented curve, it was noted considerable mass losses. The amount of compacts that fed the plant with particle size and perhaps hardness greater than could be predicted is among main responsible factors The content of Fe in the feed of the flotation and the quality of the concentrates (sinter feed and pellet feed) was a little lower than was expected, but satisfactory. The phasing strategy had a strong positive impact, avoiding greater losses, as it considerably reduced the number of shutdown days. The development of the FRAGCOM (fragmentation and comminution) project may have helped to reveal solutions to the encountered problems: this project aimed to improve the blasting process and, consequently, the comminution. The results of some tests of this project showed that the crushing achieved higher productivity rates at that time. Since crushing is the first processing circuit (a bottleneck), this is a relevant factor. For these tests, a higher blasting load ratio was used. With this and other improvements, a greater amount of compact material could be processed. Finally, the results suggested that the mass losses occurred greater difficulty in feeding the grinding circuit, impacted by the low operational efficiency of the crushing.

O cenário atual das commodities minerais tem obrigado as empresas de mineração a otimizar suas operações e buscar soluções inovadoras para manter a lucratividade desejada de suas minas, controlar os riscos envolvidos e garantir a sobrevivência do negócio. Neste contexto, com a menor disponibilidade de minérios de alto teor, os depósitos minerais remanescentes exigem a lavra e o beneficiamento de grande quantidade de massa por tonelada de metal produzido. Apesar de apresentarem um teor médio decrescente, estes depósitos frequentemente contêm regiões com minério de teor mais elevado incorporados às porções de baixo teor ou mesmo na massa estéril. Por melhor que seja o conhecimento das reservas, a lavra seletiva dessa massa de teor mais elevado é praticamente inviável operacionalmente. A forma mais eficiente de aproveitar estas reservas é por meio do processo de pré-concentração de minério por ore sorting (seleção/classificação de minério). O objetivo deste processo é remover, quanto antes possível, o material com teor não econômico. A consequência imediata é uma potencial redução dos custos de processamento e do consumo de água e energia para a mesma massa de metal produzido. Existem várias tecnologias aplicáveis em pré-concentração; este estudo é focado especificamente na apresentação e discussão dos impactos causados no empreendimento mineiro de Phu Kham (PanAust), a partir da instalação e utilização do equipamento de pré-concentração, bulk ore sorter. Este equipamento faz uso de um sensor de ressonância magnética, e tem por objetivo a separação de grandes volumes de estéril direto no transportador de correias totalmente carregado (in-pit ou correia de alimentação da usina), baseando-se nos teores medidos ou inferidos a partir de seu sensor. A pré-concentração com bulk ore sorter é fundamentalmente utilizada para aumentar a produtividade baseada na capacidade fixa da usina e atenuar os prejuízos causados pelas incertezas nas definições de teores da mina. Isto é, a partir da maior precisão no controle do teor, pode-se reduzir a diluição e a perda de minério oriundas da operacionalização e explotação das reservas minerais, controlar o teor de corte e o teor médio na alimentação da usina ou ainda separar os diversos tipos de minérios para serem tratados em diferentes rotas no processo de beneficiamento. Este trabalho estuda a viabilidade técnica e econômica da aplicação do bulk ore sorter na mina de Phu Kham, no Laos. Inicialmente a tecnologia de sorting é apresentada, juntamente com os sensores disponíveis e o sistema diversor. Os resultados econômicos foram avaliados a partir dos dados de produção da mina no ano de 2014. Sem a possibilidade da realização de estudos de amostragem, a variabilidade do minério foi estimada a partir da variância de dispersão, uma ferramenta geoestatística. A estimativa do desempenho da separação inclui os erros associados a leitura do sensor e do sistema diversor. Avaliações econômicas foram realizadas para diferentes cenários e demonstraram que o bulk ore sorter tem o potencial de aumentar a produção metálica e o lucro. Este sistema de pré-concentração permite a que apenas o material com valor agregado alimente a planta de beneficiamento. / The current scenario of mineral commodities has forced the mining companies to optimize their operations and look for innovative solutions to maintain the desired profitability of their mines, control the risks involved and ensure the survival of the business. In this context, with the depletion of high grade deposits, the remaining lower grade deposits require the mining and processing of larger volumes of material per tonne of product. These low grade deposits often contain a large proportion of barren gangue. The aim of pre-concentration is to remove this barren material at as coarse a particle size and as early in the process as possible. This has the potential to reduce processing costs, energy and water consumption and possibly ore transport requirements. There are several technologies that may be applicable for pre-concentration; this work looks specifically at bulk ore sorting. This involves the separation of a large volume of barren gangue from a fully loaded conveyor belt (in-pit or plant feed belt) based on the grade as measured or inferred from a sensor measurement. Bulk ore sorting may be used to increase the production rate through fixed plant capacity, or reduce the required size of downstream processing equipment. Uneconomic or marginal reserves may be upgraded making them economic to treat and improving the resource utilisation. Bulk ore sorting could also be used to reduce dilution and ore loss in mining operations by improving grade control, or to separate ore types to treat via different process routes. Thus, bulk ore sorting has the potential to improve the profitability and reduce the environmental impact of mining operations and may be applied in different ways. This study investigates three examples of how bulk ore sorting may be employed and the associated economic benefits. The technical and economic viability of bulk ore sorting is evaluated for a copper deposit in Laos. Bulk ore sorting technology is described briefly along with discussion of appropriate sensor and diversion systems for the copper deposit considered. The economic implications were evaluated using the actual mined material and costs from 2014 as the base-case. In the absence of sampling data, ore grade variability was estimated using geo-statistical tools based on mine grade control data. A process model of the sorter was developed considering the accuracy of the sensor measurement and errors associated with material diversion. This was used to simulate the separation performance. Economic evaluations were conducted for a number of different scenarios and demonstrated that bulk ore sorting has the potential to increase the amount of metal in product and annual profit for the operation considered. This is because it is cheaper to sort and reject below cut-off grade material contained in the plant feed than to treat this material through the processing plant. The sorter acts as a gatekeeper - only above cut-off grade material (value-adding) reports to the processing plant.

The main purpose of this study was to optimise the grain size distribution of the raw material mixture for the production of iron sinter. It well known that the constitution of the sinter mix is based on the knowledge of chemical composition and grain size distribution. Although Mittal Vanderbijlpark has fixed specifications on the physical and chemical properties of the sinter for optimal blast furnace performance, the particle size distribution of the sinter mix has not yet been optimized. This was achieved by using the granulation characteristics of the sinter mix and the green bed permeability tests. The influence of the moisture content of the feed, granulation time, and mean granule diameter on permeability was investigated on Thabazimbi and Sishen iron ore, as well as on their mixture with fluxes and without fluxes. The iron ore results indicated that the mixture containing 20% Thabazimbi iron ore and 80% Sishen iron ore with fluxes where the coke, lime and return fines were sized by removing the – 0.5 mm size fraction of the return fines and coke, and the 1 mm size fraction of lime has the highest permeability of all the studied mixtures. The sintering properties of the mixtures of optimised grain size distributions were also investigated and the results were very similar for all the mixtures and better than the base case mixture, which was not optimised with respect to grain size distribution. / Dissertation (MEng)--University of Pretoria, 2008. / Materials Science and Metallurgical Engineering / unrestricted

Kumba Iron Ore, Ltd. is the world‘s fourth largest supplier of sea-borne iron ore and currently operates two mines in South Africa namely: the Sishen mine in the Northern Cape and Thabazimbi mine in Limpopo. The Sishen mine, located at the northern end of the Maremane anticline where the bulk of the hematite ore is buried beneath younger cover lithologies, was our focus area. Here the iron resources are made up by laminated and massive ore bodies that belong to the Asbestos Hills Subgroup. These ore bodies are overlain by conglomerates, shales, flagstone and quartzite. The alkalis, potassium and phosphorous, are common constituents of iron ore, which is known to have a deleterious effect on the manufacturing of iron and steel. Therefore steel making companies charge penalties when purchasing iron ore concentrates with alkali concentrations above predetermined levels. To ensure that the export batches at the Sishen mine stay within set limits, the ores from different batches (with alkali concentration greater and below set limits) are mixed to produce a batch which meet requirements. However this solution will soon become ineffective as the low alkali ore is progressively depleted. Conventional methods used to treat high alkali ores include pyro-and hydrometallurgical methods. These approaches have several limitations such as poor product recovery, involvement of high process and energy cost and an increase in pollution load of water resources. Therefore necessitating research and development of alternative cheap and environment friendly procedures, which could supplement or replace conventional methods to ensure that mining stays economically feasible at the Sishen Iron Ore mine. The application of microorganisms to mining practices is collectively referred to as biohydrometallurgy and includes bioleaching and biooxidation processes. The phrase bioleaching refers to the conversion of an insoluble metal (typically a metal sulfide) into a soluble form (typically a metal sulfate), via microbial activity. When metals are extracted into solution, the process is referred to as bioleaching, whereas if the metal remains in the mineral, it is referred to as biooxidation. The latter term biobeneficiation refers to the selective dissolution of undesired minerals from the ores by direct or indirect action of microbes, thereby enriching the desirable mineral content. Therefore the objective of this study was to determine whether bacteria (naturally occurring on the ore or introduced species) could be used to selectively remove the alkalis from the iron ore mined at Sishen. The species evaluated were able to change the solution pH and/or form biofilms, which is assumed to have affected mineral mobilization. Data obtained during this study suggests that the composition of the ore plays a significant role in its susceptibility to bioleaching. Furthermore we also found that the indigenous cultures were more effective than the introduced species to mobilize the alkalis, which could possibly be ascribed to an adaptation of the microbes present. These preliminary results suggest that bioleaching is an effective alternative cost effective approach to treat iron ore and could possibly be implemented in future into the mining schedule at Sishen. / Dissertation (MSc)--University of Pretoria, 2011. / Microbiology and Plant Pathology / unrestricted

Molybdenum is a versatile alloying and refractory metal of strategic importance. In India almost all molybdenite is obtained currently as st byproduct from copper and uranium deposits. The present Indian production is only about 66 tonnes while the demand is over 1000 tomes. It thus becomes important to explore newer deposits of molybdenum and develop efficient beneficiation strategies to recover the metal. A potential source of primary rnolybdenite has been found in the Ham area of Dharmapuri district in Tamil Nadu. In the present investigation, taking into consideration the importance of the problem beneficiation studies have been undertaken on core - drill molybdenite ore samples from the Hanu area. Initially, detailed characterization of the molybdenite ore has been carried out with respect to its mineralogy and chemical composition. The X-ray diffkactogam of the ore has also been recorded These studies have indicated that quartz and sericite are the major minerals followed by carbonates and feldspar. Among the sulphide minerals, pyrite is dominant with trace amounts of galena, sphalerite, chalcopyrite and molybdenite. The molybdenum content in the ore sample has been determined to be about 0.1%. Liberation studies have revealed that molybdenum is more or less uniformly distributed in the different size fractions from 1.7 mm down below to 75 microns. However, mineralogical analysis of the different size fractions has indicated that about 85% of the molybdenite is liberated. from associated silicate and carbonates below 2 12 microns. The results of the flotation kinetic tests have shown that percentage recovery and grade of molybdenum foLZow an inverse relationship with time. Studies carried out to evaluate different reagent - combinations, reveal that optimum values of grade and recovery could be achieved using kerosene and M1IBC. Further, these studies have shown that flotation time of 4 minutes is adequate, as beyond this time the grade of molybdenum is found to deteriorate. Detailed mesh-of-grind studies have indicated that 20 minutes of grinding yields optimum values of molybdenum and lead in the float product and this time was fixed for all subsequent experiments. Preliminary experiments conducted to evaluate djfferent depressants for galena have shown that satisfactory results are obtained only with sodium dichromate. Optimisation studies performed to arrive at the dosage of sodium dichromate have shown that the addition of 0.25kg/t of sodium dichromate gives optimum results with respect to overall recovery and grade of molybdenum, copper and lead in the float and tailing fractions. In a similar manner, the optimum dosage of kerosene (collector for molybdenite) has been arrived at to be 0.8kg/t taking a holistic view of the grades and recoveries of the different metal values of interest. Based on the studies carried out with respect to optimization of the mesh-of-grind, depressant and collector concentrations, it became apparent that a grade of about 0.8% Mo only could be achieved with over 80% recovery. The redeeming feature however was that over 90% of the feed could be rejected at the rougher flotation stage itself with a negligence loss of about 0.02% Mo in the tailings. It was thus considered logical to further upgrade the Mo content by regrinding. An extensive flotation campaign was therefore mounted, adopting the following strategies: (1) Ist stage regrinding and one cleaning (2) IInd stage regrinding and three cleanings (3) IIIrd stage regrinding and two cleanings Based on the first stage regrinding tests it was found that by regrinding to 100% passing 106 microns, the Mo assay could be enhanced to over 32% from a initial value of about 0.1% in the feed. The enrichment ratio at this stage corresponds to about 340.After the second stage regrinding followed by three stages of cleaning, close to 75% recovery of Mo with an assay value of about 52% could be achieved, further enhancing the enrichment ratio to about 540. A few experiments were conducted using sodium cyanide during second stage regrinding tests and it was found that copper assay could be brought down to 0.3% from about 0.8%, without affecting the grade of lead and molybdenum. The results of the third stage regrinding tests have highlighted that a final concentrate assaying about 55% molybdenum with over 70% recovery could be obtained. It is worthy to mention that the concentrate so produced meets the specification of metallurgical grade molybdenite. The overall enrichment ratio obtained, commencing from a feed assaying 0.1% Mo, corresponds to about 580. In order to explore the efficacy of organic depressants, which are more acceptable on environmental grounds, detailed flotation studies were carried out using dextrin with particular emphasis on galena depression. A series of experiments was carried out in an identical manner to those conducted using sodium dichromate. Here again, three stages of regrinding/cleanings test where carried out, akin to those performed using sodium dichromate. A dextrin concentration of 0.01 kg/t was found to be an optimum value from the point of grade, wt. % recovery and distribution of molybdenum, lead and copper in the cleaner concentrate. It is noteworthy that after second stage regrinding followed by four stages of cleaning, the molybdenum assay value has significantly improved from 16% to about 53% with over 70% recovery. Another notable feature is that copper content in the concentrate is only about 0.2% even without the addition of sodium cyanide. The results of the third stage regrinding/cleaning tests have shown marginal improvement in the molybdenum assay values without affecting the grade of copper and lead. On a comparative basis, it can be inferred that dextrin holds promise to be used as a potential substitute for the inorganic depressants such as sodium dichromate and sodium cyanide. On the basis of the extensive investigations carried out on the beneficiation of molybdenite ore, a comprehensive flowsheet has been developed.

Esta dissertação está baseada no trabalho desenvolvido para adequar a usina de Conceição 1 (da Vale S.A.) para o processamento de itabiritos compactos e semi compactos, situada em Itabira-MG. Até 2014, a usina de Conceição 1 foi alimentada com hematitas e itabiritos friáveis e produzia cerca de 22 Mt/ano. Com o consumo progressivo das reservas de minérios friáveis, tornou-se necessário que a usina processasse minérios mais competentes e com menor teor de Fe: itabiritos compactos e semi compactos (40%Fe). Até então, este material era considerado estéril, uma vez que os circuitos de beneficiamento não possuíam capacidade para transformá-lo em concentrados, tendo em vista às exigências de mercado. Portanto, o principal objetivo deste trabalho foi analisar o processo de ramp-up para aumentar a capacidade de alimentação da planta para 34 Mt/ano. O dimensionamento dos equipamentos, desenho dos circuitos, bem como as premissas adotadas durante o projeto de adequação serão apresentados neste estudo. Comparando a curvas de ramp-up prevista à praticada, notou-se que houve perdas mássicas consideráveis. Dentre os principais fatores responsáveis, está a grande quantidade de materiais compactos alimentados à usina com granulometria e, talvez, dureza maior do que poderia ser previsto. Os teores de ferro na alimentação da flotação e a qualidade dos concentrados (sínter feed e pellet feed) mostraram-se um pouco abaixo, também, do previsto, porém satisfatórios A estratégia de divisão por fases teve forte impacto positivo, evitando perdas maiores, pois reduziu o número de dias de parada consideravelmente. O desenvolvimento do projeto, denominado FRAGCOM (fragmentação e cominuição), pode ter ajudado a revelar as soluções para os problemas encontrados: este visou a obter melhorias no processo de desmonte e, consequentemente, na cominuição. Os resultados analisados de alguns testes deste projeto mostraram que, na britagem, a usina atingiu maiores taxas de produtividade nesta ocasião. Dado que a britagem é o primeiro circuito de processamento (um gargalo), isto é um fator relevante. Para estes testes foi utilizada uma razão de carga maior no desmonte. Com esta e outras melhorias, uma maior quantidade de material compacto pôde ser processado. Por fim, os resultados mostraram que a falta de aderência da curva de produção prevista com respeito à praticada, deveu-se entre outros fatores, à maior dificuldade de alimentação do circuito de moagem, impactado pelo baixo rendimento operacional da britagem. / This dissertation is based on the work developed to adapt the plant of Conceição 1 (Vale S.A.) to the processing of compact and semicompact itabirites, located in Itabira-MG, southeastern Brazil. Conceição 1 plant was fed with friable hematite and itabirite and produced 22 Mt/year) until 2014. With the progressive consumption of friable ore reserves, it became necessary to process more competent and lower grade ores: compact and semicompact itabirites. Until then, this material was considered waste, since the beneficiation circuits did not have the capacity to transform it into concentrates, especially regarding market requirements. Therefore, the main objective of this work was to analyze the ramp up process in order to fed 34Mt/year. The adopted strategies and their impacts on ramp up process to achieve the production rate were analyzed. Equipment scaling, circuit design, as well as, premises and tests, which were performed during the adaptation project, are presented in this study. Comparing the planned ramp-up curve to the implemented curve, it was noted considerable mass losses. The amount of compacts that fed the plant with particle size and perhaps hardness greater than could be predicted is among main responsible factors The content of Fe in the feed of the flotation and the quality of the concentrates (sinter feed and pellet feed) was a little lower than was expected, but satisfactory. The phasing strategy had a strong positive impact, avoiding greater losses, as it considerably reduced the number of shutdown days. The development of the FRAGCOM (fragmentation and comminution) project may have helped to reveal solutions to the encountered problems: this project aimed to improve the blasting process and, consequently, the comminution. The results of some tests of this project showed that the crushing achieved higher productivity rates at that time. Since crushing is the first processing circuit (a bottleneck), this is a relevant factor. For these tests, a higher blasting load ratio was used. With this and other improvements, a greater amount of compact material could be processed. Finally, the results suggested that the mass losses occurred greater difficulty in feeding the grinding circuit, impacted by the low operational efficiency of the crushing.

This thesis examines the bioleaching of six different Canadian nickel sulphide ores at pH levels above what is generally considered optimum (~ 2). The majority of work discussed in this thesis was conducted with a low-grade metamorphosed ultramafic nickel sulphide ore from Manitoba, Canada (Ore 3), which is not currently exploitable with conventional technologies. The ore contains 21% magnesium and 0.3% nickel. Nickel is the only significant metal value, and is present primarily as pentlandite. A substantial fraction of the magnesium is present as the serpentine mineral lizardite, making processing difficult with conventional pyro- and biohydrometallurgical techniques. The work with this ore has two equally important objectives: to minimize magnesium mobilization and to obtain an acceptable level of nickel extraction. Batch stirred-tank bioleaching experiments were conducted with finely ground ore ( 147 µm) with temperature and pH control. The first phase of experimentation examined the effect of pH (2 to 6) at 30 °C, and the second phase examined all combinations of three pH levels (3, 4 and 5) and five temperatures (5, 15, 22.5, 30, and 45 °C).

[pt] A integração do controle por computador de microscópios com a aquisição e análise digital de imagens levou à criação de uma nova área, denominada Microscopia Digital. Além de permitir um certo grau de automação, a Microscopia Digital abriu possibilidades realmente novas para a caracterização microestrutural. Uma destas novas e promissoras possibilidades é a Microscopia Co-localizada, que junta diversos tipos de informação, obtidas a partir de diferentes técnicas de microscopia. No presente trabalho foi desenvolvida e implementada uma metodologia de Microscopia Co-localizada que combina imagens de Microscopia Óptica de Luz Refletida (MO) e de Microscopia Eletrônica de Varredura (MEV). Esta metodologia envolve desde a aquisição das imagens nos microscópios até a análise das fases presentes através de técnicas de Reconhecimento de Padrões. Um procedimento automático de registro entre os dois tipos de imagens foi desenvolvido, permitindo o ajuste de magnificação, translação, rotação, tamanho de pixel e distorções locais. Desta forma, imagens de MO e de MEV de uma dada amostra podem ser combinadas precisamente. A metodologia foi testada com diversas amostras minerais, visando a discriminação de fases que são indistinguíveis por MO ou MEV. A Microscopia Co-localizada MOMEV foi empregada em uma rotina para a caracterização de amostras de minério de ferro e os resultados obtidos foram comparados com os da análise tradicional ao MEV. / [en] Computer-controlled microscopes with digital image acquisition and analysis led to the creation of a new field, called Digital Microscopy. Digital Microscopy not only allows a certain degree of automation but also has brought new possibilities to microstructural characterization. One of these new and promising possibilities is Co- Site Microscopy, that links different kinds of information, obtained from different microscopy techniques. The present work presents the development and implementation of a Co-Site Microscopy methodology that combines images obtained by Reflected Light Microscopy (RLM) and Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM). This methodology involves the whole sequence, from image acquisition at the microscopes to the analysis of the phases using Pattern Recognition techniques. An automatic registration procedure for the two kinds of images was developed, allowing the adjustment of magnification, translation, rotation, and pixel size, and the correction of local distortions. The methodology was tested with several mineral samples, aiming at the discrimination of phases that are not distinguishable with either RLM or SEM. The RLM-SEM Co-Site Microscopy technique was employed in the characterization of iron ore samples and the obtained results were compared to the traditional analysis by SEM.

No description available.

No description available.