Determination of Boron and Other Common Elements in Borosilicate Glass by Inductively Coupled Plasma-Atomic Emission Spectrometry

Boron and other common elements, such as Ca, Mg, Al, Fe, Ti, Si, in borosilicate glass are commonly determined by different methods with low analytical efficiency. The measurement deviation of commonly used volumetric method for boron determination is large when B₂O₃ content is lower than 1%. B₂O₃ and other common elements were determined by Inductively Coupled Plasma-Atomic Emission Spectrometry with sample pretreated by molten KOH and are presented in this paper. The influence of KOH dosage and sample weight is also discussed. The results showed that high efficiency and good effect were found with KOH dosage higher than 3 g, and sample weight lower than 0.4 g had no effect on B₂O₃ results. Considering other determination elements, the optimum selection of KOH dosage was 3 g, and sample weight 0.1 g. Under these conditions, all RSDs(n=6) of tests were less than 2%, the recoveries of each element were from 96.0% to 105.6%, each element had perfect results besides the obvious deviation of SiO₂. The limit of quantification of B₂O₃ was 0.067%. The result was still good when B₂O₃ content reached 16%. The content range of B₂O₃ determination was at least 0.067%-16%. The accuracy and precision of this method for B₂O₃ determination were equivalent to national standard method (Volumetry) when B₂O₃ content was higher than 4% and better than volumetric method when B₂O₃ content lower than 1%. Compared with the related results, the content range of B₂O₃ determination was significantly extended in this method with high accuracy. Quantitative analysis of Ca, Mg, Al, Fe, Ti and semi-quantitative analysis of Si were simultaneously realized with B₂O₃ accurate determination. This method greatly increased analytical efficiency. Boron and other common elements can be determined quickly and accurately.