Simultaneous determination of uranium carbide dissolution products by capillary zone electrophoresis

Abstract

Separation and simultaneous determination of a number of organic acid anions (oxalate, mellitate, trimellitate and benzoate) and U(VI) with direct UV detection is developed for analysis of uranium carbide (UC) dissolution products by capillary zone electrophoresis (CZE). Reverse polarity mode is used. It is found that complex formation of U(VI) with carbonate, used as a carrier electrolyte, allows U(VI) to be determined, as negatively charged species, in a single run with organic acid anions. Some parameters such as pH value, composition of electrolyte and detection wavelength are optimized. Under the chosen conditions (carbonate buffer (ionic strength of 100 mM), pH 9.8, 0.15 mM tetradecyltrimethylammonium bromide (TTAB)) a complete separation is achieved. Calibration plots are linear in two ranges of concentration for U(VI) (∼1 × 10 −5 to 1 × 10 −3), mellitate and trimellitate (∼5 × 10 −6 to 5 × 10 −4), and about one range (∼1 × 10 −4 to 5 × 10 −3) for oxalate and benzoate. Accuracy of the procedure is checked by the “added-found” method in standard mixture solutions. Relative standard deviation is within the range of 2–10% and the recovery is in the range of 90–110%. This method is applied for the analysis of real UC dissolution samples.