Dysprosium element Critical Material
The element Dy, distinct from its dissolved ions, salts, magnets, minerals and waste streams. The dated US designation concerns the named dysprosium mineral commodity, without assigning criticality to every Dy-bearing material. The mechanism records a laboratory study of dried brewing-yeast biomass with synthetic Dy solutions; it does not establish recovery from actual industrial effluent or a purified dysprosium product.
Identifiers & Classification
| System | Identifier | Label |
|---|---|---|
| CHEBI |
CHEBI:33377
|
dysprosium atom |
Criticality Designations
| Jurisdiction | List Name | Edition / Document | Classification | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| United States of America | USGS Final List of Critical Minerals | 2025; Federal Register 90:50494-50497, 7 November 2025 | critical |
usgs2025
|
Microbial & Biochemical Mechanisms (1)
Dysprosium biosorption with dried Saccharomyces cerevisiae biomass
biosorption
Microbial
Associated Organisms:
Saccharomyces cerevisiae (NCBITaxon:4932)
Dried brewing-yeast biomass was associated with Dy uptake from synthetic nitrate solutions. This is biosorption by inactive microbial biomass, not metabolic uptake by growing yeast. Biomass elemental changes and FTIR spectra are consistent with surface interactions, but do not establish one exclusive molecular binding or ion-exchange mechanism.
Experimental Context & Analytical Limits:
Biomass identified by the authors as S. cerevisiae came from a brewing company in Chisinau, Moldova; no strain accession was supplied, so the identifier establishes species-level scope only. Biomass was dried at 105 degrees C for 24 h and homogenized at 600 rpm for 10 min. Laboratory triplicate batch assays used 0.5 g biomass in 50 mL solution, stirred at 200 rpm, varying pH 2-6, contact time 5-120 min, initial Dy 10-100 mg/L and temperature 20-50 degrees C. The pH-screening result below is attributed to the reported one-hour experiment. Methods specify pH 3, 20 degrees C and 10 mg/L for kinetics, but the results text subsequently says further experiments used pH 4; the exact common conditions across experimental arms cannot therefore be reconstructed unambiguously. The reagent is called dysprosium nitrate but its printed formula is Dy(NO3)2·6H2O, inconsistent with the paper's Dy(III) framing; no precise salt identifier is assigned here. Neutron activation analysis was described for dried biomass before and after exposure, with certified reference materials. A removal equation uses initial and final aqueous Dy concentrations, but an assay method for the final aqueous concentration is not specified. No matched biomass-free solution-control result, desorption/reuse experiment, isolated product or scale-up was reported.
Biomass identified by the authors as S. cerevisiae came from a brewing company in Chisinau, Moldova; no strain accession was supplied, so the identifier establishes species-level scope only. Biomass was dried at 105 degrees C for 24 h and homogenized at 600 rpm for 10 min. Laboratory triplicate batch assays used 0.5 g biomass in 50 mL solution, stirred at 200 rpm, varying pH 2-6, contact time 5-120 min, initial Dy 10-100 mg/L and temperature 20-50 degrees C. The pH-screening result below is attributed to the reported one-hour experiment. Methods specify pH 3, 20 degrees C and 10 mg/L for kinetics, but the results text subsequently says further experiments used pH 4; the exact common conditions across experimental arms cannot therefore be reconstructed unambiguously. The reagent is called dysprosium nitrate but its printed formula is Dy(NO3)2·6H2O, inconsistent with the paper's Dy(III) framing; no precise salt identifier is assigned here. Neutron activation analysis was described for dried biomass before and after exposure, with certified reference materials. A removal equation uses initial and final aqueous Dy concentrations, but an assay method for the final aqueous concentration is not specified. No matched biomass-free solution-control result, desorption/reuse experiment, isolated product or scale-up was reported.
Curated Evidence Points:
Support
Source:
zinicovscaia2023
Sections 2.2-2.4, Section 3.1 and Figure 1a support the dried-yeast assay and its reported pH response: removal peaked at 68% at pH 3 and fell to about 21% at pH 6. The 68% figure is the pH-screening result, not a universal maximum: Figure 1b and its text separately report approximately 85% after 60 min in the kinetics series. The conflicting pH descriptions and different arm outcomes are retained rather than averaged or combined into one optimum protocol.
Partial
Source:
zinicovscaia2023
Table 1's 5.84 +/- 0.68 mg/g is a fitted Langmuir capacity, not measured experimental uptake. Section 3.1 and Figure 1c instead report a highest tested yeast uptake of 3.85 mg/g at 100 mg/L initial Dy. Section 3.3 and Figure 4b compare biomass elemental composition and FTIR spectra; these support a binding interpretation without an abiotic loss control or an ion-exchange mass balance. These limitations, together with incomplete analytical reporting, preclude assigning all apparent solution removal to a resolved microbial surface mechanism or claiming selective Dy recovery.
Sources & References
-
chebi_dysprosium: ChEBI CHEBI:33377 - dysprosium atom; formula Dy, net charge 0
https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chebi/CHEBI:33377 (accessed 2026-10-11) -
usgs2025: USGS (2025). Final 2025 List of Critical Minerals. Federal Register 90:50494-50497, document 2025-19813; dysprosium row on page 50496.
https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2025-11-07/html/2025-19813.htm (accessed 2026-10-11) -
zinicovscaia2023: Zinicovscaia et al. (2023). The Remediation of Dysprosium-Containing Effluents Using Cyanobacteria Spirulina platensis and Yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Microorganisms 11:2009; Sections 2-3, Figures 1-4 and Table 1.
https://doi.org/10.3390/microorganisms11082009 (accessed 2026-10-11) -
ncbi_saccharomyces: NCBI Taxonomy 4932 - Saccharomyces cerevisiae; species
https://eutils.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/eutils/efetch.fcgi?db=taxonomy&id=4932&retmode=xml (accessed 2026-10-11)
Curation History
| Timestamp | Curator | Action | Summary |
|---|---|---|---|
2026-10-11T05:19:12Z |
Codex (GPT-6; Codex) | CREATE | Added verified elemental identity, dated US2025 designation and narrowly scoped dried-yeast biosorption evidence, preserving source inconsistencies and analytical/control limitations; scientific review is separate. |
Record source: data/records/dysprosium.yaml