Isolation and Purification of Uranium from Environmental Materials for Mass Spectrometric Analysis.

摘要

We describe a simple isolation and purification procedure for uranium involving a new one-step separation based on supported-liquid column chromatography, and present experimental results that demonstrate the separation's ability to provide consistent, high uranium recoveries from some typical environmental samples. The uranium product from this procedure is sufficiently pure that no solids are visible on a thermal-ionization mass spectrometer filament after the sample is deposited for analysis. We have used this procedure in determining total uranium in addition to uranium isotopy by adding an isotope-dilution spike to the sample digestate. Because the uranium recovery is good, direct assay of the uranium product by laser fluorimetry or counting techniques is also feasible. 1 fig., 1 tab. (ERA citation 14:008469)