A. Perezponce et al., DIRECT VAPOR GENERATION FOURIER-TRANSFORM INFRARED SPECTROMETRIC DETERMINATION OF ETHANOL IN BLOOD, Analytica chimica acta, 336(1-3), 1996, pp. 123-129
A new procedure is proposed for a direct determination of ethanol in p
lasma and whole blood. The method is based on the injection of a discr
ete sample volume of 10 mu l into an electrically heated Pyrex glass r
eactor in which, at a temperature of 90 degrees C, the ethanol is vola
tilized and introduced by means of a N-2 carrier flow inside a long-pa
th infrared gas cell and the corresponding flow analysis recording reg
istered as a function of time. The measurement of the area of the flow
injection recording, obtained from the absorbance of the transient si
gnal in the range 1150-950 cm(-1), allows the direct quantification of
ethanol upto 2 gl(-1), with a limit of detection of 0.020 g l(-1) and
coefficient of variation between 0.3 and 1.9% for three replicate ana
lyses of the same sample. The analysis frequency of the method is 40 h
(-1), and it can be applied to a single drop of finger blood.