Abstract

The determination of sulfate in potable water is normally accomplished by its precipitation with an excess of barium ion followed by measuring the turbidity of the suspended precipitate, gravimetry, or, as more recently advocated, flame atomic absorption (AA) measurement of nonprecipitated barium. We undertook to adapt the constant temperature Woodriff atomic absorption furnace for this very common analysis. Direct sulfur determination is not routinely performed by flame or nonflame atomic absorption because of difficulties associated with the use of the far-uv resonance lines of that element. Therefore, efforts were directed at precipitation of the sulfate with a metal ion followed by determination of the metal retained on a porous graphite filter after washing off of excess precipitant. It was discovered that nonresonance atomic absorption of the lead in a lead sulfate precipitate served the purpose.

Conceptual approach to the simultaneous determination of the backscatter and absorption coefficients of natural waters

R. P. Bukata, J. E. Bruton, and J. H. Jerome
Appl. Opt. 19(9) 1550-1559 (1980)

Water vapor absorption at the atomic iodine laser line

T. A. Wiggins
Appl. Opt. 20(20) 3481-3483 (1981)

A Modified King Furnace for Absorption Spectroscopy of Small Samples

F. S. Tomkins and B. Ercoli
Appl. Opt. 6(8) 1299-1303 (1967)

Hot Tube Atomic Absorption Spectrochemistry

Ray Woodriff and Ronald W. Stone
Appl. Opt. 7(7) 1337-1339 (1968)

Atomic Absorption Spectroscopy with High Temperature Flames

J. B. Willis
Appl. Opt. 7(7) 1295-1304 (1968)