Abstract
A method is developed for the simultaneous determination of dissolved iron, copper, and zinc in rainwater. The method involves 25-fold evaporative concentration, ion chromatographic separation and subsequent spectrophotometric detection after post-column reaction with 4-(2-pyridylazo) resorcinol. Analytical sensitivities, being defined by the slopes of calibration curves, are 0.93, 0.54, and 0.11 Abs/ $\mu$g/ml for iron, copper, zinc, respectively. Detection limits render around a few tenth of one ng/ml. Precisions evaluated by replicate analysis of real sample are better than 10% RSD. Due to the lack of certified standards for rainwater, the accuracy of the method could not be assessed directly. However, the results of this method agree well with those by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry. Analytical results for a suite of Seoul rainwaters are presented herein.
