EIT RawMaterials Start-up and SME Booster funding supported the implementation of theĀ Mineral Screen project analysing industrially important minerals with TimegatedĀ® Raman spectroscopy

Mining industry has a need to identify and localize economically feasible mineral resources and separate waste rock and gangue from valuable minerals. They are lacking an effective tool for real-time material analyses.

Timegate aims to develop novel sensing hardware tools combined with cloud-based data collection. By integrating the start-up’s offering to the service ecosystem around mining companies Timegate can help mining companies in processing and sharing of information from the mine material flows and thus help them to increase production by optimizing their mining and mineral enrichment processes.

During the EIT RawMaterials Booster project, Timegate Instruments have screened about 50 most common and important industrial minerals, both valuable and gangue, to find out detection limits of the company’s technology with these minerals which further helps the start-up in its service development. Based on the analyses, Timegate team had good results with apatite, hematite and spodumene. Also, gangues like talc and quartz can be recognized well.

Implementation of the project

Professor Alan Butcher from the Geological Survey of Finland provided his expertise and consultancy to help Timegate Instruments to identify the most important industrial minerals in the world. Based on the list, Timegate collected samples from its own mining industry network including e.g. Geological Survey of Finland and Oulu Mining School. The measured data was collected to Timegate spectral library and the specifications for cloud-based service and data offering were defined. Furthermore, the start-up mapped the business potential of monitoring services for certain mineral groups.

As a result of the project, Timegate team had a good understanding of industrially important minerals and the parameters for identifying them with its TimegatedĀ® Raman spectrometer.

Having the opportunity to work with the support of EIT RawMaterials Booster funding has given the Timegate Instruments team a great chance to get support from the well-established mining experts and improve the understanding of the industry needs and opportunities.

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