Characterization of the mineral fraction in botanical reference materials and its influence on homogeneity and analytical results

Summary The NIST natural-product leaf Standard Reference Materials have been widely used in developing reliable methods of analysis. A small amount of mineral matter present in these materials was separated by flotation, and characterized qualitatively by microscopy and quantiatively by neutron activation analysis. Several elements are concentrated in the mineral fraction, which can lead to analytical error through incomplete dissolution or sampling statistics. Two new candidate materials prepared by the Office of Standard Reference Materials, SRM 1515 Apple Leaves and SRM 1547 Peach Leaves, have been processed with an air-jet mill, resulting in a very finely ground leaf material, with particle size less than 200 mesh. A cyclone classifier in the process discriminates against coarse grit, so that the content of minerals in the ground material is less than in the first-generation materials. Better homogeneity was in fact observed, even down to 100 mg sample size. One must use caution, however, to assure that any inhomogeneity found in real samples are appropriately considered and dealt with.     

Weakly Compact Homomorphisms Between Small Algebras of Analytic Functions

The weak compactness of the composition operator C(f) = f acting on the uniform algebra of analytic uniformly continuousfunctions on the unit ball of a Banach space with the approximationproperty is characterized in terms of . The relationship betweenweak compactness and compactness of these composition operatorsand general homomorphisms is also discussed. 2000 MathematicsSubject Classification 46J15 (primary), 46E15, 46G20 (secondary).     

Delayed-neutron activation analysis at NIST

An automated delayed-neutron activation analysis system has been installed at the NIST research reactor. This work involved characterization of the transfer time of the system, evaluation of blanks, and tests of the system’s analytical capabilities through quantitative analysis for uranium in several natural matrix standard reference materials (SRMs). The calibration curve was shown to be linear up to at least 20 μg of uranium, and the well-thermalized reactor irradiation position makes the system insensitive to thorium and oxygen. For SRMs 1646a Estuarine Sediment and 2710a Montana Soil the values determined for this work agree with the reference and certified values, respectively. The mass fraction of uranium in SRM 695 Multi-Nutrient Fertilizer is the first reported for this material. For this system and the irradiation, transfer, and counting times used, the limit of detection for natural uranium is 20 ng, which corresponds to approximately 200 pg of ²³⁵U.     

Error bounds,facial residual functions and applications to the exponential cone

Mathematical Programming - We construct a general framework for deriving error bounds for conic feasibility problems. In particular, our approach allows one to work with cones that fail to be...