Preconcentration of Noble Metals in Geological and Environmental Samples: A Nickel Sulfide Mini-bead Technique

Abstract

A nickel sulfide mini-bead technique to preconcentrate noble metals has been developed. Following this technique, several types of geological, environmental and international reference samples have been fused successfully. The recovery of the noble metals from 10g of reference material with only 0.25g Ni has been found to be as good as that achieved by larger amounts of nickel. The homogeneous distribution of noble metals within the bead was confirmed by laser ablation ICP-MS analysis. Chemical composition of flux suitable for different types of samples was established.