Exploiting zone trapping to avoid liberation of air bubbles in flow-based analytical procedures requiring heating

In flow-based analytical procedures requiring heating, liberation of air bubbles is avoided by trapping a sample selected portion into a heated hermetic environment. The flow-through cuvette is maintained into a temperature-controlled aluminium block, thus acting as the trapping element and allowing real-time monitoring. The feasibility of the innovation was demonstrated in the spectrophotometric catalytic determination of vanadium in mineral waters. Air bubbles were not released even for temperatures as high as 95°C. The proposed system handles about 25 samples per hour, requires only 3 mg p-anisidine per determination and yields precise results (r.s.d. = 2.1%), in agreement with ICP-MS. Detection limit was evaluated (3.3 σ criterion) as 0.1 μg L(-1) V.