Typical speciation analysis seldom involves multielement analysis, simply because the focus of interest is often on the speciation of a single target element. However, the multielement capabilities of ICP-MS on one site, and the economic pressure to reduce costs, waste and time needed for the analysis, is the driving force to develop methods for multielemental speciation analysis.
Background:Speciation analysis calls for more complex instrumentation than simple trace element analysis and therefore also for higher costs for analysis. This is further exaggerated by the lower sample throughput in speciation analysis in comparison to trace element analysis. The costs for speciation analysis could be reduced by reducing the analysis time per sample and analysing more than one element per analysis simultaneously. Also the simultaneous speciation of different elements provides more comprehensive information about a definite sample especially on the relationship between different forms of different elements.
Problems for multielement speciation analysis:
Unfortunately, the requirements for sampling, preserving species, sample pretreatment and separating species are demanding. It is not easy to optimize conditions for multielement speciation in a single run.
HPLC-ICP-MS for multielement speciation analysis:
In general multi-element speciation analysis by LC-ICP-MS is not that straight forward, since separation conditions for more than one group of elemental species are not easy to establish. Even further, sample preparation often requires special attention for different elemental species distribution. Because of such difficulties LC-ICP-MS multi-element speciation methods most often focus on a limited set of species such as redox couples (As(IIII)As(V), Se(IV)/Se(VI)) and Cr(III)/Cr(VI) in natural water samples for which sample preparation does not require critical extraction.
Apart from such oxidation species some researchers also tried to develop methods for multi-element determination of biomolecules as binding partners of metals in body fluids. Fast protein liquid chromatography was evaluated already in 1999 for such purpose but also size-exclusion chromatography has been used.
GC-ICP-MS for multielement speciation analysis:
While multi-element capabilities are only seldom demanded for LC-ICP-MS, multi-element applications are quite common for GC-ICP-MS. Time-of-flight ICP-MS systems can deliver about 20.000 full range spectra per second. They are ideal instruments for multi-element analysis with GC coupling. The capabilities of GC-ICP-TOFMS were mainly explored in the period 2000-2005. Unfortunately, early commercial instruments could not reach high enough market share. Currently, two manufacturers (GBC and Tofwerk) are still on the market with an ICP-TOFMS instrument. The ICP-TOFMS instrument by Tofwerk was recently introduced.
CE-ICP-MS for multielemental Speciation analysis:
Compared to other chromatographic techniques, CE provides relatively gentle separation conditions and can therefore preserve the integrity of complex molecules. CE also has the advantage of high separation efficiency, making it more suitable to find compromise conditions for multielement speciation analysis.
Related studies
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Further chapters on techniques and methodology for speciation analysis:
Chapter 1:
Tools for elemental speciation Chapter 2: ICP-MS - A versatile detection system for speciation analysis Chapter 3: LC-ICP-MS - The most often used hyphenated system for speciation analysis Chapter 4: GC-ICP-MS- A very sensitive hyphenated system for speciation analysis Chapter 5: CE-ICP-MS for speciation analysis Chapter 6: ESI-MS: The tool for the identification of species Chapter 7: Speciation Analysis - Striving for Quality Chapter 8: Atomic Fluorescence Spectrometry as a Detection System for Speciation Analysis Chapter 9: Gas chromatography for the separation of elemental species Chapter 10: Plasma source detection techniques for gas chromatography Chapter 11: Fractionation as a first step towards speciation analysis Chapter 12: Flow-injection inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry for speciation analysis Chapter
13: Gel electrophoresis combined with laser ablation inductively
coupled plasma mass spectrometry for speciation analysis Chapter 14: Non-chromatographic separation techniques for speciation analysis
last time modified: January 14, 2024
