title: Determination of uranium in seawater samples by liquid chromatography using mandelic acid as a complexing agent.
abstract: The determination of uranium at different stages of the recovery process as well as in seawater is important in its recovery study. A previous study developed a high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) method for uranium determination in seawater using α-hydroxy isobutyric acid as a chelating agent. However, this method causes turbidity in process samples containing high amounts of iron, resulting in the clogging of the HPLC column. In the present work, use of mandelic acid as a chelating agent for uranium has been explored. Elution conditions were optimized for the separation of iron [Fe(III)] and uranium [U(VI)] by studying the effect of an ion interaction reagent, the concentration of mandelic acid, and methanol content in the mobile phase. Different parameters were optimized to develop off- line pre-concentration of uranyl-mandelate on the reversed stationary phase. The method offers quantitative recovery of uranium and linearity in the U(VI) concentration range of 0.5 ppb to 500 ppb and can be used for the determination of U(VI) in process samples with Fe/U amount ratios up to 3,000. The method has been successfully used for the determination of U(VI) in seawater samples and process samples. The developed methodology was validated by comparing the results with those of isotope dilution-thermal ionization mass spectrometry.
authors.affiliation: Fuel Chemistry Division, Bhabha Atomic Research Centre, Trombay, Mumbai 400 085, India. pg_jaison@yahoo.com
authors.forename: P G
authors.initials: PG
authors.lastname: Jaison
authors.forename: Vijay M
authors.initials: VM
authors.lastname: Telmore
authors.forename: Pranaw
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Kumar
authors.forename: Suresh K
authors.initials: SK
authors.lastname: Aggarwal
mesh_terms: D002614:Chelating Agents / Q000737:chemistry*; D002851:Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid / Q000379:methods*; D016014:Linear Models; D008333:Mandelic Acids / Q000737:chemistry*; D012623:Seawater / Q000032:analysis*; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D014501:Uranium / Q000302:isolation & purification*
chemical_list: D002614:Chelating Agents; D008333:Mandelic Acids; D014501:Uranium; C037938:mandelic acid