A modified spectrophotometric determination of orthophosphate with reagent-immobilized poly(vinyl alcohol) films

Abstract

A simple and rapid method for the determination of orthophosphate was developed in this study. The method is based on a reagent-immobilized poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) film which is prepared by temporary immobilization of sensitive reagents on the glass slide. The preparation conditions of the film were investigated in detail. Under the optimum conditions, the absorbance is linearly proportional to the concentration of phosphorus from 0.65 to 8.1 μmol L⁻¹ and the limit of detection is 0.5 μmol L⁻¹ of phosphorus. The relative standard deviation is 2.9% (n = 10). The proposed method has been effectively used for the determination of orthophosphate in various water samples.