Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Inter-laboratory study for the certification of trace elements in seawater certified reference materials NASS-7 and CASS-6

  • Research Paper
  • Published:
Analytical and Bioanalytical Chemistry Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Certification of trace metals in seawater certified reference materials (CRMs) NASS-7 and CASS-6 is described. At the National Research Council Canada (NRC), column separation was performed to remove the seawater matrix prior to the determination of Cd, Cr, Cu, Fe, Pb, Mn, Mo, Ni, U, V, and Zn, whereas As was directly measured in 10-fold diluted seawater samples, and B was directly measured in 200-fold diluted seawater samples. High-resolution inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (HR-ICPMS) was used for elemental analyses, with double isotope dilution for the accurate determination of B, Cd, Cr, Cu, Fe, Pb, Mo, Ni, U, and Zn in seawater NASS-7 and CASS-6, and standard addition calibration for As, Co, Mn, and V. In addition, all analytes were measured using standard addition calibration with triple quadrupole (QQQ)-ICPMS to provide a second set of data at NRC. Expert laboratories worldwide were invited to contribute data to the certification of trace metals in NASS-7 and CASS-6. Various analytical methods were employed by participants including column separation, co-precipitation, and simple dilution coupled to ICPMS detection or flow injection analysis coupled to chemiluminescence detection, with use of double isotope dilution calibration, matrix matching external calibration, and standard addition calibration. Results presented in this study show that majority of laboratories have demonstrated their measurement capabilities for the accurate determination of trace metals in seawater. As a result of this comparison, certified/reference values and associated uncertainties were assigned for 14 elements in seawater CRMs NASS-7 and CASS-6, suitable for the validation of methods used for seawater analysis.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Morel FM, Price NM. The biogeochemical cycles of trace metals in the oceans. Science. 2003;300:944–7.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  2. Coale KH, Fitzwater SE, Gordon RM, Johnson KS, Barber RT. Control of community growth and export production by upwelled iron in the equatorial Pacific Ocean. Nature. 1996;379:621–4.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  3. Lee JM, Boyle EA, Echegoyen-Sanz Y, Fitzsimmons JN, Zhang R, Kayser RA. Analysis of trace metals (Cu, Cd, Pb, and Fe) in seawater using single batch nitrilotriacetate resin extraction and isotope dilution inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry. Anal Chim Acta. 2011;686:93–101.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  4. Bruland KW, Franks RP, Knauer GA, Martin JH. Sampling and analytical methods for the determination of copper, cadmium, zinc and nickel at the nanogram per liter level in seawater. Anal Chim Acta. 1979;105:233–45.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  5. Orians KJ, Bruland KW. The biogeochemistry of aluminum in the Pacific Ocean. Earth Planet Sci Lett. 1986;78:397–410.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  6. Landing WM, Bruland KW. The contrasting biogeochemistry of iron and manganese in the Pacific Ocean. Geochim Cosmochim Acta. 1987;51:29–43.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  7. Santosa SJ, Tanaka S, Yamanaka K. Sequential determination of trace metals in sea water by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry after electrothermal vaporization of their dithiocarmabamate complexes in methyl isobutyl ketone. Environ Monit Assess. 1997;44:515–28.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  8. Martínez-Soto MC, Tovar-Sánchez A, Sánchez-Quiles D, Rodellas V, Garcia-Orellana J, Basterretxea G. Seasonal variation and sources of dissolved trace metals in Maó Harbour. Minorca Island Sci Total Environ. 2016;565:191–9.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  9. Boyle EA, Sclater FR, Edmond JM. The distribution of dissolved copper in the Pacific. Earth Planet Sci Lett. 1977;37:38–54.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  10. German CR, Elderfied H. Rare earth elements in the NW Indian Ocean. Geochim Cosmochim Acta. 1990;54:1929–40.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  11. Wu J, Boyle EA. Low blank preconcentration technique for the determination of lead, copper, and cadmium in small-volume seawater samples by isotope dilution ICPMS. Anal Chem. 1997;69:2464–70.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  12. Saito MA, Schneider DL. Examination of precipitation chemistry and improvements in precision using the Mg(OH)2 preconcentration ICP-MS method for high-throughput analysis of open-ocean Fe and Mn in seawater. Anal Chim Acta. 2006;565:222–33.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  13. Wu J. Determination of picomolar iron in seawater by double Mg(OH)2 precipitation isotope dilution high-resolution ICPMS. Mar Chem. 2007;103:370–81.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  14. Boyle EA, Handy B, Geen A. Cobalt determination in natural waters using cation exchange liquid chromatography with luminol chemiluminescence detection. Anal Chem. 1987;59:1499–503.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  15. Willie SN, Lam JWH, Yang L, Tao G. On-line removal of Ca, Na and Mg from iminodiacetate resin for the determination of trace elements in seawater and fish otoliths by flow injection ICP-MS. Anal Chim Acta. 2001;447:143–52.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  16. Oliveira EP, Yang L, Sturgeon RE, Santelli RE, Bezerra MA, Willie SN, et al. Determination of trace metals in high-salinity petroleum produced formation water by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry following on-line analyte separation/preconcentration. J Anal At Spectrom. 2011;26:578–85.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  17. Conway TM, Rosenberg AD, Adkins JF, John SG. A new method for precise determination of iron, zinc and cadmium stable isotope ratios in seawater by double-spike mass spectrometry. Anal Chim Acta. 2013;793:44–52.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  18. López Guerrero MM, Vereda Alonso E, Cano Pavón JM, Siles Cordero MT, García de Torres A. Simultaneous determination of chemical vapour generation forming elements (As, Bi, Sb, Se, Sn, Cd, Pt, Pd, Hg) and non-chemical vapour forming elements (Cu, Cr, Mn, Zn, Co) by ICP-OES. J. Anal. At. Spectrom. 2016;31:975–84.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  19. Ho TY, Chien CT, Wang BN, Siriraks A. Determination of trace metals in seawater by an automated flow injection ion chromatograph pretreatment system with ICPMS. Talanta. 2010;82:1478–84.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  20. Sohrin Y, Urushihara S, Nakatsuka S, Kono T, Higo E, Minami T, et al. Multielemental determination of GEOTRACES key trace metals in seawater by ICPMS after preconcentration using an ethylenediaminetriacetic acid chelating resin. Anal Chem. 2008;80:6267–73.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  21. McLaren JW, Mykytiuk AP, Willie SN, Berman SS. Determination of trace metals in seawater by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry with preconcentration on silica-immobilized 8-hydroxyquinoline. Anal Chem. 1985;57:2907–11.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  22. Hill S. Inductively coupled plasma spectrometry and its applications. Oxford, U. K.: Blackwell Publishing; 2007.

    Google Scholar 

  23. De Bièvre P. Isotope dilution mass spectrometry in trace element analysis in biological specimens. Herber RFM, Stoeppler M. (Eds), Elsevier, Amsterdam, 1994.

  24. Report of the 5th Meeting of the Commité Consultatif pour la Quantité de Matière, BIPM, Paris, February 1999.

  25. Yang L, Sturgeon RE. High accuracy and precision isotope dilution mass spectrometry: an application to the determination of Mo in seawater. J Anal At Spectrom. 2009;24:1327–35.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  26. Houk RS. Mass spectrometry of inductively coupled plasmas. Anal Chem. 1986;58:97A–105.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  27. Field MP, Cullen JT, Sherrell RM. Direct determination of 10 trace metals in 50 mL samples of coastal seawater using desolvating micronebulization sector field ICP-MS. J Anal At Spectrom. 1999;14:1425–31.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  28. ISO/IEC 17025:2005(E), General requirements for the competence of testing and calibration laboratories, 2005.

  29. International Organization for Standardization. International Vocabulary of Basic and General Terms in Metrology. 2. Geneva, Switzerland: ISO; 1993.

  30. Meija J, Methven B, Sturgeon RE. Uncertainty of relative sensitivity factors in glow discharge mass spectrometry. Metrologia. 2017;54:796–804.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  31. DerSimonian R, Laird N. Meta-analysis in clinical trials. Control Clin Trials. 1986;7:177–88.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  32. Meija J, Pagliano E, Mester Z. Coordinate swapping in standard addition graphs for analytical chemistry: a simplified path for uncertainty calculation in linear and nonlinear plots. Anal Chem. 2014;86:8563–7.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  33. Willie SN, Sturgeon RE, Berman SS. Determination of total chromium in seawater by graphite furnace atomic absorption spectrometry. Anal Chem. 1983;55:983–5.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  34. Van Vark W, Crum S. AQ3 metals in seawater. 2015.

  35. Cofino WP, van Stokkum IHM, Wells DE, Ariese F, Wegener JWM, Peerboom RAL. A new model for the inference of population characteristics from experimental data using uncertainties. Application to interlaboratory studies. Chemom Intell Lab Syst. 2000;53:37–55.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  36. Glabonjat RA, Raber G, Van Mooy BAS, Francesconi KA. Arsenobetaine in seawater: depth profiles from selected sites in the North Atlantic. Environ Sci Technol. 2018;52:522–30.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  37. Matoušek T, Currier JM, Trojánková N, Saunders RJ, Ishida MC, González-Horta C, et al. Selective hydride generation-cryotrapping-ICP-MS for arsenic speciation analysis at picogram levels: analysis of river and sea water reference materials and human bladder epithelial cells. J Anal At Spectrom. 2013;28:1456–65.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  38. CCQM guidance note: estimation of a consensus KCRV and associated degrees of equivalence. Version 10, 2013–04-12.

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. National Research Council Canada (NRC), 1200 Montreal Rd, Ottawa, Ontario, K1A 0R6, Canada

    Lu Yang, Kenny Nadeau, Juris Meija, Patricia Grinberg, Enea Pagliano & Zoltán Mester

  2. Department of Chemistry and Industrial Chemistry, University of Genoa (UG), Via Dodecaneso 31, 16146, Genoa, Italy

    Francisco Ardini & Marco Grotti

  3. GEOMAR - Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research (GEOMAR), Wischhofstr 1-3, 24148, Kiel, Germany

    Christian Schlosser, Peter Streu & Eric P. Achterberg

  4. Institute for Chemical Research, Kyoto University (KU), Gokasho, Uji-city, Kyoto, 611-0011, Japan

    Yoshiki Sohrin, Tomoharu Minami & Linjie Zheng

  5. Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science (RSMAS), 4600 Rickenbacker Causeway, Miami, FL, 33149, USA

    Jingfeng Wu & Gedun Chen

  6. School of Biology and Marine sciences, Shenzhen University, Shenzhen, 518060, Guangdong, China

    Jingfeng Wu

  7. Research School of Earth Sciences, The Australian National University (ANU), Canberra, ACT, 2601, Australia

    Michael J. Ellwood

  8. Institute for the Dynamics of Environmental Processes, National Research Council of Italy (DEP), Via Torino 155, 30172, Venezia-Mestre, (VE), Italy

    Clara Turetta

  9. CFOS/IARC, University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF), Fairbanks, AK, 99775-7220, USA

    Ana Aguilar-Islas & Robert Rember

  10. Laboratoire des sciences de l’Environnement MARin (LEMAR), UMR CNRS UBO IRD Ifremer 6539, Place Nicolas Copernic, Technopôle Brest Iroise, 29280, Plouzané, France

    Géraldine Sarthou, Manon Tonnard & Hélène Planquette

  11. Institute for Marine Antarctic Studies, University of Tasmania, 20 Castray Esplanade, Battery Point, Hobart, TAS, 7004, Australia

    Manon Tonnard

  12. Institute of Analytical Chemistry of the Czech Academy of Sciences (IAC), Veveří 97, 602 00, Brno, Czech Republic

    Tomáš Matoušek

  13. QUASIMEME, NL- 6700 EC Wageningen, Bornsesteeg 10, Bennekom, 6721 NG, Ede, The Netherlands

    Steven Crum

Authors
  1. Lu Yang
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Kenny Nadeau
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Juris Meija
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Patricia Grinberg
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. Enea Pagliano
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  6. Francisco Ardini
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  7. Marco Grotti
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  8. Christian Schlosser
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  9. Peter Streu
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  10. Eric P. Achterberg
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  11. Yoshiki Sohrin
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  12. Tomoharu Minami
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  13. Linjie Zheng
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  14. Jingfeng Wu
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  15. Gedun Chen
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  16. Michael J. Ellwood
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  17. Clara Turetta
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  18. Ana Aguilar-Islas
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  19. Robert Rember
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  20. Géraldine Sarthou
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  21. Manon Tonnard
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  22. Hélène Planquette
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  23. Tomáš Matoušek
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  24. Steven Crum
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  25. Zoltán Mester
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Lu Yang.

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Electronic supplementary material

ESM 1

(PDF 345 kb)

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Yang, L., Nadeau, K., Meija, J. et al. Inter-laboratory study for the certification of trace elements in seawater certified reference materials NASS-7 and CASS-6. Anal Bioanal Chem 410, 4469–4479 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00216-018-1102-y

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Revised:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00216-018-1102-y

Keywords

Search

Navigation