Bacterial and chemical leaching of metals has established itself as an alternative technology for hydrometallurgical processing and enrichment of ore due to a reduction in capital costs and adverse environmental impact. Various bioleaching processes are successfully used for the processing of sulfide concentrates, poor sulfide and oxidized ores. One of the most important tasks for further development of this branch of biotechnology is the improvement of bioreactor installations (in particular – flow type) and installation of systems of additional control of technological parameters. The article briefly highlights the main results obtained at the GSRC of FEB of RAS within the framework of bioleaching studies of sulfide cobalt-copper-nickel ore. A description of a bioreactor for the study of bioleaching in a batch mode and a cascade type reactor for studying bioleaching in a continuous mode is given. A model of an improved bioreactor for bacterial-chemical leaching of sulfide ore is presented. A detailed description of the microcontroller control method for technological parameters is given. The field of application of the presented results is laboratory, integrated and semi-industrial tests of the technology of tank and reactor bacterial-chemical leaching of sulfide ores.
