{"id":14827,"date":"2023-09-18T04:23:02","date_gmt":"2023-09-17T22:53:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=14827"},"modified":"2025-04-02T23:12:20","modified_gmt":"2025-04-02T17:42:20","slug":"string-technology","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/string-technology\/","title":{"rendered":"Lithium production through String Technology"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><strong>About the String Technology<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>A set of\u00a0<strong>porous fibres twisted into strings<\/strong> and engineered them to have a water-loving (hydrophilic) core and water-repelling surface.<\/li>\n<li>When one end is dipped in a salt-water solution, the water travels up the string because of capillary action.<\/li>\n<li>Then, the water evaporates quickly from the string\u2019s surface. This leaves behind\u00a0<strong>salt ions such as sodium and lithium.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>The\u00a0<strong>water will continue to evaporate<\/strong> like this as the salts become increasingly concentrated, eventually forming sodium chloride and lithium chloride crystals.<\/li>\n<li>The strings don\u2019t just concentrate the salts. Since lithium and sodium have different physical properties, they crystallise at different locations on the strings.<\/li>\n<li>Sodium, with its low solubility, crystallises on the lower part, while the highly soluble lithium salts crystallise near the top.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h3>Current method of production<\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li>A large majority of the lithium produced in the world is extracted from\u00a0<strong>\u201cbrine reservoirs\u201d located in salt flats.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Conventional methods of extraction rely on a\u00a0<strong>series of massive evaporation ponds<\/strong> that concentrate lithium from saltwater reservoirs, salt flats of underground aquifers.\u00a0<\/li>\n<li>This method of production can\u00a0<strong>require hundreds of square kilometres<\/strong>, and it often takes months or even years to produce lithium that can be used in batteries.<\/li>\n<li>It is commercially viable in a few locations around the world.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h3>Key facts about Lithium<\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li>It is a\u00a0<strong>soft, silvery-white metal<\/strong> that belongs to the\u00a0<strong>alkali metals group<\/strong>, of the periodic table of the elements.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Features<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>It has the\u00a0<strong>lowest density<\/strong> of all metals.<\/li>\n<li>It is the lightest of the solid elements.\u00a0<\/li>\n<li>It\u00a0<strong>reacts vigorously<\/strong> with\u00a0<strong>water.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Occurrence:\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>It does not occur as a metal in nature but is found combined in small amounts in igneous rocks.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Major Reserves:\u00a0<\/strong>Its reserves are majorly concentrated in the\u00a0<strong>lithium triangle in South America<\/strong> \u2013 Argentina, Bolivia &amp; Chile, with 50% of the deposits concentrated in these regions.\u00a0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<h3>Q1) What is alkali metal?<\/h3>\n<p>The alkali metals are a group of chemical elements located in Group 1 of the periodic table. They are known for their highly reactive nature and are some of the most reactive elements in the periodic table.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Source: <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/indianexpress.com\/article\/technology\/science\/lithium-production-mining-string-technology-8938008\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><u>New \u2018string\u2019 technology could revolutionise lithium production<\/u><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Lithium production through String Technology reduces the amount of land and time needed for production of Lithium.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":14829,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-14827","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","8":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14827","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14827"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14827\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14829"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14827"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14827"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14827"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}