Determination of mercury in urine by ET-AAS using complexation with dithizone and extraction with cyclohexane

A precise and accurate graphite furnace atomic absorption spectrometric method for the determination of mercury in urine was developed. Samples were subjected to hydrolysis with nitric acid. Then, mercury in the sample was complexed by dithizone and extracted by cyclohexane. Mercury concentrations were determined against a urinematched calibration curve. Coated graphite notched partition tubes (Varian) and forked pyrolytic platforms (Varian) were used. The detection limit of the method (x(blank) + 3 SD(blank)) was 1 mug 1(-1). The between run precision CV's were 4.7 and 3.4% for urine with a mercury concentration of 48.2 and 156.2 mumol 1(-1), respectively; the within run precision CV's were 8.9 and 2.9% for urine with a mercury concentration of 17.0 and 172 mug 1(-1), respectively.