Kinetic-Spectrophotometric Determination of Trace Quantities of Thiocyanate Based on Its Landolt Effect on the Reaction of Bromate with Hydrochloric Acid1

A new method for the rapid and sensitive determination of trace quantities of thiocyanate based on its Landolt effect on the bromate-hydrochloric acid reaction was developed. The induction period of the reaction is proportional to the SCN^– concentration. The decolorization of methyl orange by the reaction products was used to monitor the reaction spectrophotometrically at 525 nm. We were able to determine thiocyanate in the range 2 × 10^–7–4 × 10^–5 M by this method. The relative standard deviation for 10 determinations of 1.5 × 10^–6 M thiocyanate ion is 0.19% and the detection limit of the method was 7.00 × 10^–8 M. The method was applied to the determination of thiocyanate in human blood serum and of saliva samples with satisfactory results.