Mercury Determination in Fish Samples by Wet Digestion and Flameless Atomic Absorption Spectrophotometry

Abstract

A simple, rapid method is given for determination in fish of mercury at concentrations measured in parts per million (ppm). Samples are digested at 50–60 C with sulphuric acid and oxidised with permanganate. Mercury in the digest is determined by atomic absorption spectrophotometry. Recovery of mercury added to samples was complete, with good precision. Standard deviations from triplicate analyses were ±0.039 at the 0.1 ppm level and ±0.051 at the 0.5 ppm level. In a day, three workers analysed 15–20 samples in triplicate.