(504b) Migration of Metal Ions in Strong Magnetic Fields

Magnetomigration, or the movement of solutes under an externally imposed magnetic field gradients, has many practical applications in chemical separation, pollutant removal, and drug delivery; however, this phenomenon is still poorly understood. In this work, we investigate the motion of metal ions subject to magnetic fields using a combination of experiments and simulations. A modified version of the Stefan-Maxwell model is numerically solved for a mixture of ions in aqueous solutions under strong gradients in magnetic fields. Additionally, experiments are performed using a range of aqueous solutions in a porous medium. Our simulations predict that ions can overcome their thermal motion and experience net motion towards strong magnetic gradient fields. Our experiments indicate significant enrichment for paramagnetic ions towards stronger magnetic fields, consistent with our simulations.