Optimization of experimental parameters in the determination of zinc in sea water by adsorptive stripping voltammetry

Abstract

A procedure for the determination of zinc in sea water by square wave adsorptive stripping voltammetry (SWAdSV) using 8-hydroxyquinoline (oxine) as an adsorbing and complexing agent has been optimized. First, a univariate study of the Zn-Ox complex peak current as a function of pH was carried out choosing values at which adequate currents were obtained. Then, selection of the experimental conditions was made using a multivariate experimental design. Variables like pH, oxine concentration (Cox), adsorption time (tads) and adsorption potential (Eads) were optimized. The first optimization step was a 24 factorial design with 16 measurements made choosing high and low levels, and three measurements at the central point (Zn(II) 10.0 μg L-1). Analysis of variance showed that pH and Cox were the most significant factors, while tads and Eads were not significant and were kept constant in later measurements. Next, to find the optimum values for pH and Cox a 22 + star factorial design was used. The best experimental parameters were pH = 6.0; Cox = 25 μmol L-1; tads = 10 s and Eads = -0.70 V. Under these conditions the peak current was proportional to the concentration of zinc over the 0.1-48.0 μg L-1 range, with a detection limit of 0.05 μg L-1. Reproducibility for 5.0 μg mL-1 Zn(II) solution was 1.9 % (n = 16). The method was validated using spiked synthetic sea water (ASTM D665), sea water reference material (CRM-SW. Zn 5 μg kg-1) and fortified water reference material (GBW08607. Zn 5 mg kg-1) with satisfactory results. Finally, the method was successfully applied to the determination of Zn(II) in sea water samples without prior treatment.