Indirect gold trap–MC-ICP-MS coupling for Hg stable isotope analysis using a syringe injection interface
- 21 February 2008
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) in Journal of Analytical Atomic Spectrometry
- Vol. 23 (4), 569-573
- https://doi.org/10.1039/b718181g
Abstract
Gold traps are part of standard instrumentation to quantitatively pre-concentrate gaseous elemental mercury, Hg0 (g), and are a pre-requisite for atmospheric Hg0 (g) analysis. High precision mercury stable isotope ratio analysis by on-line coupling of gold traps to multi collector-inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (MC-ICP-MS) has up to now been problematic due to the transient nature of the signal. We present a new off-line technique, where amalgamated elemental Hg0 is volatilized from the gold trap in an argon gas stream and temporarily stored in a large volume gas tight syringe. Hg0 (g) contained in the syringe is then injected on-line into the MC-ICP-MS interface using a syringe pump at a continuous flow rate and resulting in a steady state Hg signal. Different syringe injection schemes are discussed, as well as matrix effects. The 2SD external precision on an in-house Hg0 vapor standard was found to be 0.24‰ for δ202Hg. The method is illustrated for fumerole Hg0 (g) emissions at Vulcano (Italy) with δ202Hg of −1.74‰ relative to NIST SRM 3133.Keywords
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