Mineral-Organic Interactions Related to Oil Sands Processing

Dear Colleagues,

The importance of mineral–organic interactions in oil sands processing has been discussed for several decades. Whether residual organics adhering to mineral particle surfaces arise from the presence of humic matter originally present in the sedimentary rock before oil migration or result from interaction of bitumen components (mostly asphaltenes and resins) with mineral surfaces, particularly clays, has been intensively debated. However, much of this dispute has been happening orally at oil sands conferences, and relatively little literature has appeared to directly address these questions in terms of their particular influence on oil sands processing.

In this Special Issue, we wish to attract contributions at the confluent of the emerging analytical techniques allowing deeper molecular-scale direct probing or rational inference of the effects of mineral–organic interactions in macroscopic oil sands processing technologies employed for bitumen extraction, processing, and upgrading.

We would like to produce a well balanced isue and therefore would like to invite authors to contribute both experimental and theoretical/computational studies dealing with fundamental and/or applied aspects that will help to further our understanding of the aforementioned questions as they pertain to oil sands processing.

Dr. Patrick H.J. Mercier
Guest Editor

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