The sustainable access to uranium resource is critical for the sustainable development of nuclear energy industry. The global seawater contains thousands of times more uranium reserves than that on the land and can be a promising supply of uranium. Nevertheless, extraction of uranium from seawater is challenging due to the complex seawater environment and it’s urgent to develop adsorbents that suitable for being used in seawater environment. Herein, inspired by the high uranium concentrations in natural marine animal carapaces, the grinded marine crab carapace is used for uranium extraction. The crystalline calcium carbonate in crab carapace is identified as functional components for uranium adsorption for the first time. The grinded crab carapace achieves a high uranium extraction capacity of 1.38 mg g⁻¹ in natural seawater. The EXAFS analysis and DFT calculations reveal that uranyl ion from seawater is bound by forming coordination bonds between uranium atom and oxygen atoms from the carbonate group and between axial oxygen atom from uranyl ion with calcium atom. Considering the promising uranium binding ability in natural seawater, the marine crab carapaces are highly potential for being used in uranium extraction from seawater.

铀资源的可持续获取对于核能产业的可持续发展至关重要。全球海水中的铀储量比陆地上的铀储量多数千倍，是很有前景的铀供应源。然而，由于海水环境复杂，从海水中提取铀具有挑战性，迫切需要开发适用于海水环境的吸附剂。在此，受天然海洋动物甲壳中高浓度铀的启发，研磨的海洋蟹甲壳用于提取铀。蟹壳中的结晶碳酸钙首次被确定为吸附铀的功能成分。研磨后的蟹壳可实现 1.38 mg g ^-1的高铀提取能力在天然海水中。EXAFS 分析和 DFT 计算表明，海水中的铀酰离子通过铀原子与碳酸酯基团的氧原子之间以及铀酰离子的轴向氧原子与钙原子之间形成配位键而结合。考虑到天然海水中铀的结合能力，海洋蟹壳在海水中提取铀的潜力很大。