Improvement of Pulse Amperometric Detection Integrated Automated Flow Injection Analysis of Ethylenethiourea Determination

Abstract

AbstractImprovement of pulse amperometric detection (PAD) method is demonstrated in determination of ethylenethiourea (imidazolidine‐2‐thione, ETU). The anodic detection of ETU will produce polymeric film on an electrode leading to an inactive electrode surface. Here, the PAD method was used to remove the polymeric film formed on the electrode surface between ETU detection. Further, the scheme was integrated with automated flow injection analysis (AFIA) for determining ETU. The operational parameters of PAD in the AFIA system were discussed thoroughly. The analytical characteristics of the system were evaluated at optimum conditions. The linear range of calibration plot was between 20 to 300 μM (the correlative coefficient, r = 0.999) and the detection limit was 0.9 μM (S/N = 3). The relative standard deviations of detection of 50 μM ETU were 0.82% with and 9.07% without PAD scheme. The results indicate the system is a very promising tool for ETU determination. Finally, the matrix effects of two water samples that were collected from a campus and a farm show good recoveries of 92% and 96%.