Potentialities of thermospray fame furnace atomic absorption spectrometry (TS-FF-AAS) in the fast sequential determination of Cd, Cu, Pb and Zn

In this study, the combination of thermospray flame furnace atomic absorption spectrometry (TS-FF-AAS) and fast sequential flame atomic absorption spectrometry (FS-FAAS) for the sequential determination of Cd, Cu, Pb and Zn is presented and a significant improvement in the analytical throughput of TS-FF-AAS is obtained. Ni tubes of different designs were evaluated observing the necessary read delay to obtain maximum absorbance and avoid memory effects. All experiments were performed in a flame atomic absorption spectrometer working in fast sequential mode fitted with a deuterium background corrector. The fast sequential TS-FF-AAS system has been optimized for Cd, Cu, Pb and Zn whereby it was found that a Ni tube with an internal diameter of 8 mm with 10 holes on the bottom side combined with a ceramic capillary of 0.5 mm internal diameter and a delay time of 60 seconds gave the best results (adequate absorbance values and no memory effects). After 60 seconds read delay, Cd, Cu, Pb and Zn could be determined in 12 seconds (3 seconds each element). Limits of detection obtained for Cd, Cu, Pb and Zn were 0.3, 7.5, 4.4 and 0.3 mu g L-1, respectively.