1989 Volume 5 Issue 2 Pages 181-184
Various trace amounts of germanium in water were concentrated by the Coprecipitation technique with hafnium hydroxide, and determined by graphite furnace atomic absorption spectrometry. At pH 7.5-10.5, hafnium hydroxide coprecipitates almost completely 0.3-10μg of germanium from pure solution (less than 200ml) and more than 80% of germanium from natural waters (less than 200ml). The atomic absorbance of germanium is increased about 6 times by the presence of hafnium. The calibration curve is linear from 12 to 400ng ml-1 of germanium. The detection limit (signal/noise=2) was 0.3ng ml-1 of germanium in 200ml of the initial pure solution. This method was successfully applied to the determination of germanium in spring water, using the standard addition method.