Analytical Electron Microscopy of Carbon-Rich Mineral Aggregates in Solvent-Diluted Bitumen Products from Mined Alberta Oil Sands
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Contaminant solids in solvent-diluted bitumen product obtained by solvent extraction and solids agglomeration (SESA) of Alberta oil sands are characterized using aberration-corrected scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM). In particular, the distribution of carbon present in these contaminant solids is determined from spatially resolved spectroscopy. Three distinct types of carbon-rich particles are identified and consist of carbonate minerals, micrometer-sized particles of toluene-insoluble organic carbon, and clay aggregates containing toluene-insoluble organic carbon. Energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX) maps confirm the presence of carbonates, in addition to other minerals, whose abundances are determined by a recently developed quantitative phase analysis methodology. Carbonaceous micrometer-sized particles with detectable amounts of oxygen and sulfur also appear in the elemental maps and suggest the presence of bitumen-unrelated organic materials. Finally, EDX maps also suggest an intricate sub-micrometer association of carbon with clay minerals. To map the distribution of light elements and transition metals in these clay aggregates, electron energy-loss spectroscopy (EELS) analysis has been carried out at the nanometer scale. In addition to carbon-rich regions, sub-10-nm titanium and iron oxide particles are often found dispersed on the clay surfaces. By observing clay platelets in orientations both parallel and perpendicular to the electron beam, EELS maps confirm that the carbon is present on the surface of the clays, rather than intercalated between individual clay mineral layers within the crystal structure. Furthermore, the organic coating is not uniform, displaying carbon-rich features with dimension on the order of a few nanometers, while leaving some regions of the clay mineral surface exposed. Partial nanometer-scale organic coverage has been proposed to result in a biwettable character for clay platelets that will influence the bitumen extraction process, and such coverage has been shown here directly for the first time using spatially resolved spectroscopic microscopy observations.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".