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You all saw http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2013-05/cornstarch-replaces-cyanide-clean-new-gold-extraction-method and all the chatter at https://www.reddit.com/comments/1ebwy6 and even at University site http://www.northwestern.edu/newscenter/stories/2013/05/making-gold-green-new-non-toxic-method-for-mining-gold.html reviewing/commenting on the original paper http://www.nature.com/ncomms/journal/v4/n5/full/ncomms2891.html "Scientists accidentally discover a new way to isolate gold that is much safer than existing processes, which use toxic cyanide...."
Well, it's a some bit of BS. Corn starch cannot replace Cyanide in Gold leaching.
As a gold solvent, cornstarch is not going to work. Cornstarch may work as a depressant for silicates in flotation - depends on the mineralogy of the ore, yes.
Need to carry out comparison tests in the laboratory against other depressants.
Au has to be extracted (from ore/concentrate) into a bromide phase (toxic halogen) before it can be recovered from solution using cornstarch.
Selective Isolation of Gold by Alpha-Cyclodextrin has nothing to do with leaching gold from rock.
It is not going to change the world.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTG74ixGSiE