Emission spectrochemical determination of chromium in organic acids

An emission spectrochemical procedure is described which directly determines the chromium concentration in organic materials in the p.p.m. range. The only preparation of the sample which is necessary is dilution with a graphite matrix which contains the internal standard element and the spectral buffer, lithium carbonate. The effect of sodium on spectral line intensities of cobalt and chromium is shown. The effectiveness of lithium carbonate as a spectral buffer is illustrated. The precision of the technique is estimated to be ± 11.8% and the accuracy estimated to be 10.9%.