Patent ID: 8801936

Claim:
A method for separating a dispersed phase or a dissolved material from a continuous phase comprising the steps of i) contacting said phases with an effective amount of nanoparticles; ii) applying a magnetic field gradient to the obtained system; iii) separating the obtained phases wherein said nanoparticles are of the core shell type, said core consists of a metal or alloy having soft magnetic properties and said shell contains one or more graphene-layers said nanoparticles having saturation magnetization of at least 120 A m 2 /kg, said graphene layer having a thickness between 0.3-5 nm, said graphene layer being functionalized by one or more of the groups according to formula (I): wherein n is an integer between 1 and 5; m is an integer between 0 and 20; Z represents a spacer selected from the group of alkyl, alkenyl, alkyloxy, peptides, amino acids saccharides; FG represents independent from each other OH, OR, NO 2 , NH 2 , NHR, NR 2 , COH, COR, COOH, COOR, SO 2 , SOR, SO 2 R, halogen, P(O)OH, P(O)OR, P(O) 2 OH, P(O) 2 OR R represents C 1 -C 4 alkyl, C 1 -C 4 alkoxy, C 3 -C 10 cyclo-alkyl, C 4 -C 10 aryl, or a 5-membered heterocycle containing at least one atom selected from the group of N, O, S or a 6-membered heterocycle containing at least one atom selected from the group of N, O, S or a metal chelating group selected from the group consisting of polycarboxylic acids, polyamides, polyamides, amino acids, polyaminocarboxylates, polyamines, polysulfides; and its salts.