Rapid spectrophotometric determination of nitrates and nitrites in marine aqueous culture media

• Type: Article in International Scientific Journal
• Date: 1998

Authors

Carvalho, AP (Author) Other; Meireles, LA (Author) Other; F. Xavier Malcata (Author) Other

Journal

Title: Analusis

Vol. 26

Pages: 347-351

ISSN: 0365-4877

Publisher: EDP Sciences

Indexing

ISI Web of Knowledge - 13 Citations

Scopus - 21 Citations

Other information

Authenticus ID: P-001-6SJ

DOI: 10.1051/analusis:1998183

Abstract (EN): The spectrophotometric determination of nitrate in sea water broths for cultivation of, say, microalgae is complicated by the frequent presence of nitrite. Two methods surphamic/perchloric acid method (also known as Cawse method) and sulphamic acid method - both claimed to be able to eliminate nitrite interference, were tested using a set of standards, but statistical treatment of the results proved their limitations in nitrate quantification. An improved method, based on former published methods for quantification of nitrite and coupled determination of nitrate and nitrite, was designed and tested. This improved method was compared with the reference method (based on use of a cadmium column) using several standards and biological samples of two culture media far microalgae, in different phases of their growth curve. The results thus obtained have demonstrated that there is no statistically significant difference between them at the 5% level. The precision of the method was tested by repealing determinations with three sets of standard mixtures containing nitrate and nitrite. The method proposed has advantages over conventional methods in reduced time of analysis, as well as high precision and accuracy, so it may be a good alternative for determination of nitrite and nitrate in marine aqueous media.

Language: English

Type (Professor's evaluation): Scientific

No. of pages: 5