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Determination of Total Mercury in Soils and Sediments
Author(s) -
Floyd M.,
Sommers L. E.
Publication year - 1975
Publication title -
journal of environmental quality
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.888
H-Index - 171
eISSN - 1537-2537
pISSN - 0047-2425
DOI - 10.2134/jeq1975.00472425000400030007x
Subject(s) - mercury (programming language) , chemistry , environmental chemistry , atomic absorption spectroscopy , soil water , chloride , sulfide , mercure , soil test , sediment , mineralogy , analytical chemistry (journal) , environmental science , soil science , geology , paleontology , programming language , physics , organic chemistry , quantum mechanics , computer science
A simple one‐step digestion procedure was evaluated for extracting total mercury from soils and sediments. The procedure evaluated involves digesting soil or sediment samples with concentrated HNO 3 and 4 N K 2 Cr 2 O 7 (2:1, vol/vol) for 4 hours at 55C and analyzing mercury in the extract by flameless atomic absorption. Recovery of total mercury from diverse samples was comparable to or exceeded that obtained by four alternative total mercury procedures. Essentially quantitative recovery of mercury was obtained when samples were amended with mercuric chloride, methylmercuric chloride, phenylmercuric acetate, and mercuric sulfide. The procedure developed was precise with coefficients of variation ranging from 1 to 3%. Parameters affecting the quantitative extraction of total mercury were studied.