Scandium analysis in silicon-containing minerals by inductively coupled plasma tandem mass spectrometry

作者：Whitty Leveille Laurence; Drouin Elisabeth; Constantin Marc; Bazin Claude; Lariviere Dominic^*

来源：Spectrochimica Acta Part B: Atomic Spectroscopy , 2016, 118: 112-118.

DOI：10.1016/j.sab.2016.02.014

• Mineral samples
• Polyatomic interferences
• Inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry
• Reaction cell
• Silica

This article reports on the development of a new method for the accurate and precise determination of the amount of scandium, Sc, in silicon-containing minerals, based on the use of tandem quadrupole inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS/MS). The tandem quadrupole instrument enables new mass filtering configurations, which can reduce polyatomic interferences during the determination of Sc in mineral matrices. He and O-2 were used and compared as collision and reaction gases for the removal of interferences at m/z 45 and 61.
Using helium gas was ineffective to overcome all of the spectral interferences observed at m/z 45 and particularly for Si-based interferences. However, conversion of Sc+ ions into ScO+ ions (after bombardment with O-2 in the octopole reaction system coupled with the use of the instrument in MS/MS mass-shift mode) provided interference-free conditions and sufficiently low limits of detection, down to 3 ng L-1, to accurately detect Sc. The accuracy of the proposed methodology was assessed by analyzing five different reference materials (BX-N, OKA-2, NIM-L SY-3 and GH).

• 出版日期2016-4-1