Hydrothermal Mobilisation of the Rare Earth Elements – a Tale of “Ceria” and “Yttria”

Although the rare earth elements have been thought by many to be immobile in hydrothermal fluids, we have known since the first attempts to separate them in the early nineteenth century that they are soluble in aqueous solutions. Driven by a need to isolate individual REEs for industrial applications, and more recently to explore for them, we have started to develop an understanding of their solubility and speciation in hydrothermal fluids. This knowledge is allowing us to understand the processes that promote their transport in the Earth’s crust, their concentration, and their fractionation.