The applicability of the second-derivative method to room-temperature phosphorescence analysis

The use of the second-derivative (d²) technique to overcome some of the problems encountered in room-temperature phosphorescence analysis is investigated. Despite some reduction in the signal-to-noise values, the d²-technique was shown to be particularly suited to improving the selectivity of the assay. The utility of this method for applications in multicomponent mixture analysis is discussed. The two most significant figures of merit for room-temperature phosphorescence are the reduction of spectral overlap and the decrease of background interference.