Abstract
An improved determination system for arsenic was developed, in which a zinc column-arsine generator is coupled directly to the atomic absorption spectrophotometric apparatus. It has been confirmed that arsine is not evolved quantitatively with the ordinary arsine generation flask, but is generated by using the zinc column-arsine generator. For example, the recovery of arsenic contained in fish meat showed low values of only 50-70% in the case of ordinary arsine generation flask. This would be due to the decrease of arsine evolved from the flask solution containing a large amount of ammonium sulfate which was produced by digestion of the sample using sulfuric-nitric acid mixture, followed by neutralization. In the case of the zinc column-arsine generator, evolution of arsine was quantitative. Even in the presence of a large amount of ammonium sulfate, being due to the complete contact of the test solution with the excess amount of zinc.
