SEPARATION METHOD TO OVERCOME THE INTERFERENCE OF CALCIUM ON THE URANIUM DETERMINATION BY ICP-ES

The accurate determination of uranium by Inductively Coupled Plasma Em ission Spectrometry (ICP-ES) in calcium phosphate matrix suffers from a severe ionization interference due to the high calcium content of th e samples, This leads to a signal depression up to 30%. For reliable d eterminations an extraction method based on anion exchange resin colum n chromatography is described which separates uranium for the needs in ICP-ES measurements. The results are comparable with results obtained by other determination methods. In addition, reference materials were measured to verify this extraction procedure.