Determination of arsenic, antimony, tungsten and molybdenum in silicate materials by epithermal neutron activation and inorganic ion exchange

Abstract

Ion exchange on alumina columns was used to determine As, Sb, W and Mo in silicate rock samples. This procedure requires hour-long epithermal neutron irradiations, rapid ion exchange after the rocks have been brought into solution with sodium hydroxide, sodium peroxide fusion and short gamma-ray counts on an intrinsic Ge detector. With this technique the detection limits achieved were 5 ng g −1 for As, 10 ng g −1 for Sb and W and 50 ng g −1 for Mo.