Determination of rare earth impurities in high purity zirconium dioxide byelectrothermal vaporization inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometry using 1-phenyl-3-methyl-4-benzoyl-5-pyrazone as extractant and chemical modifier

A novel method has been developed for the determination of trace La, Eu and Y in high purity ZrO2 by electrothermal vaporization inductively coupled p lasma atomic emission spectrometry (ETV-ICP-AES) with 1-phenyl-3-methyl-4-b enzoyl-5-pyrazone (PMBP) as extractant and chemical modifier. The matrix wa s quantitatively separated from the selected elements in 6M HNO3 medium by extraction with 0.1M PMBP in chloroform. The vaporization behaviors, effect factors and analytical characteristics of above selected elements were inv estigated in detail. Under the optimized conditions, the detection limits w ere 8.0, 0.9 and 1.0ng ml(-1) for La, Eu and Y with the relative standard d eviations of 3.3, 3.4 and 4.0% (n=7, c=0.5 mu g ml(-1)), respectively. The proposed method has been applied to determine trace impurities in ZrO2.