Determination Of Selenium In Foods Research Articles

Automated infrared ashing with palladium nitrate as an ashing aid for the determination of selenium in plant foods by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry.

Based on the automatic light wave ashing instrument, palladium nitrate was used as an ashing aid for the first time to collect selenium in the process of food ashing pre-treatment, and a method for the determination of selenium in food by ashing method was established with inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry. At the same time, the effects of magnesium nitrate, rhodium nitrate, and nickel nitrate as ashing aids on selenium collection were investigated using certified plant standard materials. The capture of selenium by magnesium nitrate, rhodium nitrate, and nickel nitrate as ashing aids did not exceed 50%. Using palladium nitrate as an ashing aid, six food standard materials were measured, with selenium recovery rates ranging from 97 to 106%. A complete analysis cycle can be completed within an hour. The method detection limit of selenium was 0.021μgg-1, and the relative standard deviation of five measurements was less than 7%. The experimental results show that palladium nitrate is an excellent ashing aid for capturing selenium, and it is far superior to the other three aids. In addition, the mechanism of palladium nitrate as an ashing aid for capturing selenium was discussed.

Determination of selenium in foods by pseudo-cyclic neutron activation and anti-coincidence gamma-ray spectrometry

A pseudo-cyclic instrumental neutron activation analysis method in conjunction with anti-coincidence gamma-ray spectrometry (PC-INAA-AC) has been developed for the determination of ppb levels of Se. The method consists of repetitions of the irradiation-decay-counting cycles of a sample using the rapid transfer cyclic system at the Dalhousie University SLOWPOKE-2 reactor facility. The 162-keV γ-ray of 77mSe (t 1/2 = 17.4 s) has been found to be highly selective. The precision and detection limits are significantly improved and the total experimental time drastically reduced by this method. Detection limits are between 2 and 9 ng. The accuracy of the method has been evaluated by analyzing a number of nutritional reference materials. The PC-INAA-AC method has been applied for the routine determination of Se to the composites of 135 food samples with values ranging from as low as 1 ng g−1 for tea to 1,045 ng g−1 for organ meats on fresh weight basis.

Electrothermal Atomic Absorption Spectrometric Determination of Selenium in Foods and Diets

The validity of 2 electrothermal atomic absorption spectrometric methods for determination of selenium in foods and diets was tested. By using 0.5% Ni(II) as a matrix modifier to prevent selenium losses during the ashing step, it was shown that selenium can be determined in samples containing greater than or equal to 1 microgram Se/g dry wt without organic extraction. The mean recovery tested, using NBS Bovine Liver, was 98%; recovery of added inorganic selenium in Bovine Liver matrix was 100%. In addition, this method gave values closest to the median value of all participating laboratories using hydride generation AAS or the spectrofluorometric method in a collaborative study on high selenium wheat, flour, and toast samples. For samples with concentrations less than 1 microgram Se/g dry wt, separation of selenium from interfering Fe and P ions by organic extraction was necessary. Using inorganic 75Se in meat and human milk matrixes, an ammonium pyrrolidine dithiocarbamate-methyl isobutyl ketone-extraction system with added Cu(II) as a matrix modifier yielded the best extraction recoveries, 97 and 98%, respectively. Accuracy and precision of the method were tested using several official and unofficial biological standard materials. The mean accuracy was within 4% of the certified or best values of the standard materials and the day-to-day variation was 9%. The Se/Fe or Se/P interference limits proved to be low enough not to affect selenium determinations in practically all foods or diets. The practical detection limit of the method was 3 ng Se/g dry wt for 1.0 g dry wt samples.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Spectrofluorimetric determination and thin-layer chromatographic identification of selenium in foods.

A method is described for the determination of selenium in foods. Digestion of the samples and fluorimetric determination are based on the method of Michie et al., with minor modifications. To confirm the results from a qualitative point of view, a new thin-layer chromatographic procedure is proposed.

Selenium in Foods: Evaluation of Atomic Absorption Spectrometric Techniques Involving Hydrogen Selenide Generation and Carbon Furnace Atomization

The performance of hydrogen selenide generation- and carbon furnace atomization-atomic absorption spectrometry, with a semiautomated trace metal accessory and a carbon rod atomizer, respectively, was evaluated for the determination of selenium in foods. Samples were digested with nitric, perchloric, and sulfuric acids for both procedures. Hydrogen selenide was generated with stannous chloride/potassium iodide/zinc from 20 ml aliquots in a hydrochloric-sulfuric acid medium and directed into an argon-hydrogen-entrained air flame. Sample matrix interferences in the carbon furnace technique were minimized by isolating selenium by precipitation with ascorbic acid and redissolution in nitric-perchloric acid prior to taking 5 mul aliquots for estimation; precision was significantly improved by incorporating 5000 mug nickel/ml into analytical solutions. For the hydrogen selenide and carbon furnace techniques, respectively, the following data were obtained for untreated standard solutions: sensitivity, 0.13 and 10.0 ng/ml; absolute sensitivity, 2.6 and 0.05 ng; detection limit, 0.4 and 90 ng/ml; absolute detection limit, 7 and 0.45 ng. The detection limit and absolute detection limit for samples were 2.5 ng/ml and 50 ng, respectively, for the hydrogen selenide method, and 25 ng/ml and 0.13 ng, respectively, for the carbon furnace method. Taking into consideration these figures and the practical aspects of both methods, the overall performance of the hydrogen selenide method was superior.

Fluorometric Determination of Selenium in Foods

Abstract A fluorometric method using 2,3-diaminonaphthalene for estimating selenium has been evaluated with regard to its applicability to food samples. Charring of the sample during digestion appeared to result in losses of native and added selenium from some samples, so a modified wet digestion procedure was introduced. Digestion first in nitric acid followed by a mixture of nitric-perchloric-sulfuric acids substantially reduced the incidence of sample charring for a variety of foods. The mean apparent recovery of selenium added as selenite or selenate at 100 and 500 ng levels to 0.1 and 1.0 g corn cereal, skim milk powder, and meat and 0.1 g fish was 101.0%; the actual recovery of the same levels of selenium from standard solutions was 96.6%. For a variety of samples containing 5—750 ng native or added selenium, the standard deviation as 4.7 + 1.95 X 10-2W ng, where W = ng selenium in the sample taken for analysis. The relative standard deviation (RSD) as a function of selenium weight (ng) was 50% (10), 6.7% (100), 4.3% (200), 3.1% (400), 2.7% (600), and 2.5% (800). The detection limit (weight of selenium at which RSD = 50%) was 10 ng at a mean blank level of 25 ng.

Collaborative Study of a Fluorometric Method for Determining Selenium in Foods

Abstract A fluorometric method for the determination of selenium in foods reported previously was studied collaboratively. Nineteen laboratories reported analytical results on 10 samples representative of vegetables, cereal, dairy products, meat, and fish, and containing naturally occurring selenium. For the 5 pairs of samples, the coefficients of variation based on precision standard deviation were 2 5 . 9% at 16 ng selenium, 15.8% at 98 ng, 8.5% at 233 ng, 6.1% at 379 ng, and 4.1 % at 427 ng. The corresponding coefficients of variation computed from overall standard deviations were 65.3, 17.5, 8.9, 8.1, and 5.6%. Systematic error was significant for 2 pairs (F-test, p = 0.01), but not for the remaining 3 (p = 0.05). The ratio of the systematic error standard deviation to the precision standard deviation varied from 0.21 to 1.64. Analyses of 2 NBS standard reference materials, orchard leaves (75 ng selenium) and bovine liver (208 ng selenium), yielded results higher by 16 and 10%, respectively. The precision and accuracy of the collaborative procedure were deemed acceptable and the method has been adopted as official first action.