The determination of cadmium in soils, plants and fertilizers by dithizone extraction and atomic absorption spectroscopy

Abstract

Abstract Methods are proposed for the determination of cadmium in soils, plants and fertilizers. Soil is first dissolved by treatment with hydrofluoric and hydrochloric acids and plant material is digested with nitric‐perchloric‐sulphuric acids. The cadmium is then extracted from the resulting solutions as the dithizone complex. After destruction of the dithizone the cadmium is dissolved in dilute hydrochloric acid and determined by atomic absorption spectroscopy. Cadmium in phosphatic fertilizers is determined directly by atomic absorption measurement on hydrochloric acid digests of the fertilizer. The proposed methods have precision adequate for the study of cadmium in soil‐plant systems, the limits of detection being: plant material, 0.004 ppm Cd; soils, 0.02 ppm; and phosphatic fertilizers, 1 ppm. Key words: Cadmiumplant analysissoil analysisfertilizer analysisatomic absorption