Electrochemistry of lanthanum and uranium chlorides in organic media: Deposition of lanthanum and uranium

Molten salts have been widely used for the electrochemical preparation of lanthanum and uranium metals at high temperature. In this paper we demonstrate the feasibility of a similar process in dimethylformamide (DMF) and in the mixture gamma-butyrolactone/tetrahydrofuran (gamma-BL/THF) The best conditions for the preparation were deduced from preliminary transient electrochemistry experiments and from secondary ions mass spectrometry (SIMS) measurements involving SIMS mappings and SIMS depth profile analyses.