Determination of Rare Earth Elements in Geological Reference Materials: A Comparative Study by INAA and ICP‐MS

Abstract

Data was obtained for the rare earth elements (REE) by instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA) and inductively coupled plasma‐mass spectrometry (ICP‐MS) in twenty geological reference materials. In general, the precision obtained by ICP‐MS is better for the light REE, decreasing with increasing atomic number. This is partly a result of the occurrence of the heavy REE at low concentrations. The precision of the data obtained by INAA is good (5% RSD). The data obtained also showed that for the elements determined by both methods, the accuracy is similar for the light REE and better for the middle and heavy REEs by INAA. Higher uncertainty is achieved by ICP‐MS mainly for elements at very low concentrations, occurring at about ten times the chondritic values.