Atomic-absorption spectrometric determination of calcium, magnesium and potassium in leaf samples after decomposition with molten sodium hydroxide

Abstract The decomposition of standard leaf samples of varied origin and nature by fusion with sodium hydroxide in an open system has been studied. The use of sodium nitrate as an auxiliary agent facilitated the mineralization of most of the samples. The solutions obtained were analysed for calcium, magnesium and potassium by flame atomic-absorption spectrometry. The method is fast and quite precise, with absolute standard deviations of 0.04–0.13, 0.002-0.03 and 0.04–0.12% for calcium, magnesium and potassium contents of O.8-5.0, 0.13–0.48 and 0.36–2.2% respectively. The limits of detection (μg/ml) in the determination step were 0.10 for calcium, 0.011 for magnesium, and 0.09 for potassium.