The synergistic extractic extraction of lithium with a solution of o-phenylazophenols (HAX) and trioctylphosphine oxide (TOPO) or other trialkylphosphine oxide (TRPO, R = C8-10) in o-dichlorobenzene from aqueous solution of lithium hydroxide was reported. The structural effect of o-phenylazophenols on extraction of lithium has been examined. In the case of 1-(p-X-phenylazo)-2-naphthols, the HMO calculation shows that the charge density of azo nitrogen atom(the donor atom, denote azo N) and hydroxyl oxygen atom does not very apparently, so that the stability of their chelates with lithium has no obvious variations as well. In this case their ability to extract lithium is chiefly governed by the pKa. of the compound. The results of extraction prove that there is a linear correlation between the extraction constant Kex and pKa. However, for the second group of chelating agents, the change of their structure leads to the change of the change of both pKa and stability of chelates. The results of extraction and HMO calculation show that the stability of chelates is mainly influenced by the strength of the coordination bond, i.e. the larger the charge density of azo N (qN), the more stable the chelate will be. Therefore, their ability to extract lithium is roughly directly proportional to the stability of chelates and inversely to the pKa. the strength of coordination bond for the chelates can be experimentally measured by means of the strength of intramolecular hydrogen bond of chelating agent, ΔδOH (the diference of chemical shift of hydroxyl proton in free and bonded state). Therefore, the ratio, ΔδOH/pKa, can be used to evaluate the extraction ability of chelating agents to lithium. We find that it is approximately proportional to the distribution ratio (D).

Key words: EXTRACTIVE AGENT, ALKALI METAL, EXTRACTION, STRUCTURE AND PROPERTY CORRELATION, AZO COMPOUNDS, LITHIUM, SYNERGIC SOLVENT EXTRACTION