UV-Photochemical Cold Mercury Vapor Generation as a Derivatization Step Between HPLC Separation and AAS Detection for Speciation Analysis of Selected Mercury Compounds

Abstract

Mercury chloride (Hg+II), methylmercury chloride (MeHg+I), ethylmercury chloride (EtHg+I), and phenylmercury chloride (PhHg+II) have been chosen as model compounds. UV-photochemical cold mercury vapor generation was used as a derivatization step between high performance liquid chromatography on reverse phases (RP-HPLC) and atomic absorption spectrometry with quartz detection tube.

Keywords

• mercury speciation
• UV-photochemical cold mercury vapor generation
• HPLC
• AAS