Screening and specification of colour changes of nitritometric indicators

Abstract

The specification of colour changes of nitritometric indicators, viz., cresyl fast violet acetate, amethyst violet, safranine O, neutral red, methylene violet, neutral violet, phenosafranine, brilliant cresyl blue and lissamine blue BF, in the titration of sulphanilamide has been carried out with the help of tristimulus colorimetry. Apart from the determination of true colour co-ordinates and complementary colour co-ordinates, the quantitative parameters specific colour discrimination (SCD), total colour difference (ΔE*) values of CIE La*b*, CIE Lu*v* and LAB HNU colour spaces together with the standard deviation of colour matching (ΔS) were also evaluated for all the indicators at different concentrations ratios of nitrite and sulphanilamide, for a quantitative measure of quality of colour change. The quality of colour change of many of the studied indicators is further improved by screening with appropriate inert colorants to obtain a colour transition between complementary colours through colourlessness at the equivalence point.