Determination of Volatile Sulfur Compounds by Atomic Fluorescence Spectrometry

Abstract

Atomic fluorescence spectrometry is evaluated for the determination of volatile sulfur compounds. The detector is shown to exhibit very high tolerance for organic compounds which do not contain sulfur. A flow of 600 μg/sec of hexane into the hydrogen diffusion flame used as the atomizer did not produce a detectable signal itself, nor did it affect the fluorescence signal of 80 ng/sec of H₂S. Atomic fluorescence was used to determine H₂S and SO₂ as they were sequentially volatilized from aqueous samples buffered with sodium ascorbate. The relative merits of the described spectrometer and of the more conventional flame photometric detector are considered for the determination of volatile sulfur compounds in complex matrices.

Key Words:

• Sulfur
• atomic fluorescence spectrometry
• hydrogen sulfide
• sulfur dioxide