Crown ether functionalized silver nanoparticles for colorimetric detection of alkali earth metals in real boiler feed water samples

Abstract

Abstract In the steam boiler industry, it is very important to use boiler feed water with high purity to ensure proper operation and efficiency of the boilers. However, most of the water resources in our earth crust are contaminated with the dissolved solids especially alkali earth metals. When we use boiler feed water contaminated with alkali earth metals directly in steam boilers it causes several troubles to the boilers including scale and sludge formation, priming and foaming, caustic embrittlement and eventually boiler corrosion. Therefore, it is essential to employ an analytical method to detect alkali earth metals in boiler feed water samples. Here we develop a highly specific 4’-aminobenzo-18-crown-6 (ABCE) modified Ag nanoparticles (Ag NPs@ABCE) for the detection of alkali earth metals in boiler feed waters. We have used deionized water, drinking and tap water as boiler feed water samples for the investigations with our functionalized Ag probe. The final result shows that our Ag NPs@ABCE probe can be used for detecting alkali earth metals in boiler feed waters with higher sensitivity and selectivity.