Abstract
A new fast method for determination of mobile zinc fractions in soil is proposed in this work. The three-stage modified BCR procedure used for fractionation of zinc in soil was accelerated by using ultrasounds. The working parameters of an ultrasound probe, a power and a time of sonication, were optimized in order to acquire the content of analyte in soil extracts obtained by ultrasound-assisted sequential extraction (USE) consistent with that obtained by conventional modified Community Bureau of Reference (BCR) procedure. The content of zinc in extracts was determined by flame atomic absorption spectrometry. The developed USE procedure allowed for shortening the total extraction time from 48 h to 27 min in comparison to conventional modified BCR procedure. The method was fully validated, and the uncertainty budget was evaluated. The trueness and reproducibility of the developed method was confirmed by analysis of certified reference material of lake sediment BCR-701. The applicability of the procedure for fast, low costs and reliable determination of mobile zinc fraction in soil, which may be useful for assessing of anthropogenic impacts on natural resources and environmental monitoring purposes, was proved by analysis of different types of soil collected from Podlaskie Province (Poland).Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s10661-015-5020-6) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
Highlights
The presence of zinc in agricultural soils is of increasing concern due to its health risks to plants, humans and animals as well as its adverse effects to soil ecosystems
We used an ultrasonic probe for speeding up the extraction of zinc fraction from soil
The temperature remained practically constant during sonication when solid ice was used, while placing the centrifuge tube in cold water allowed to keep the temperature below 50 °C (Fig. 1b)
Summary
The presence of zinc in agricultural soils is of increasing concern due to its health risks to plants, humans and animals as well as its adverse effects to soil ecosystems. Zinc occurs in soil at a very wide concentration range of 5–770 mg kg−1, with average values in the range of 60– 89 mg kg−1 on dependence of type of soil (KabataPendias 2011). The warning and critical limits for zinc in soil were set at 150 and 300 mg kg−1 (Council Directive 86/278/EEC 1986). High concentration of zinc in contaminated soil may cause serious phytotoxicity to plants and/or its entrance into food chain (Prasad and Freitas 2003; Finžgar et al 2007). As zinc is present in soil in several chemical forms, its total content does not give enough information about its bioavailability. The methods based on Tessier’s (Tessier et al 1979)
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