Premium
Alkaline Oxidation Method for Determination of Total Sulfur in Plant Materials 1
Author(s) -
Tabatabai M. A.,
Chae Y. M.
Publication year - 1982
Publication title -
agronomy journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.752
H-Index - 131
eISSN - 1435-0645
pISSN - 0002-1962
DOI - 10.2134/agronj1982.00021962007400020034x
Subject(s) - digestion (alchemy) , chemistry , sulfur , sulfate , methylene blue , plant tissue , distillation , chromatography , botany , organic chemistry , biology , photocatalysis , catalysis
Current wet digestion methods available for determination of total S in plant materials are unsafe and usually give inaccurate results. A rapid and precise method of determining total S in plant materials has been developed. The plant sample is heated with NaOBr solution to oxidize plant S compounds to sulfate, and the sulfate thus formed is reduced to H 2 S by a modified Johnson‐Nishita procedure and determined colorimetrically as methylene blue. Its results for total Sare generally higher than those obtained by the HCIO 4 ‐digestion method, suggesting possible loss of S, as gases, or incomplete oxidation of S during digestion of plant samples with HCIO 4 . In addition to being safe, digestion of plant samples with NaOBr is more rapid than with HCIO 4 . By using a bank of 10 distillation units, a single operator can perform 60 analyses in a normal working day.