Flow injection atomic absorption spectrometry with air compensation

Abstract

Flow injection atomic absorption spectrometry (FI-AAS) with air compensation was studied and compared with Fl-AAS using solvent compensation and with conventional AAS. It seems clear that air compensation offers important advantages, as the great increase in nebulisation efficiency improves the sensitivity and selectivity. The reproducibility obtained for both peak height and peak area is similar to or better than that obtained using other FI-AAS systems and comparable to that given by conventional AAS. The problem of using a pumping flow-rate lower than that of the nebuliser aspiration (necessary for chromatographic and solvent extraction procedures coupled with FI-AAS) is solved using the air compensation method with advantages over other procedures.