Background Correction in AAS

Absorption by the flame atomizer itself as well as by concomitants introduced into the flame or electrothermal atomizer can cause serious problems in AAS. Rarely are there interferences from absorption of the analyte line by other atoms since the HCL lines are so narrow. Molecular species can absorb the radiation and cause errors in AA measurements, however. The total measured aborbance background absorbance A B :
AT = AA + AB

AT in AA is the sum of the analyte absorbance

A A plus the

Background correction schemes attempt to measure

A A = AT - A B

AB

Continuum Source background correction A popular background correction scheme in commercial AA spectrometers is the continuum lamp technique. Here a deuterium lamp and a HCL are directed through the atomizer at different times. The HCL measures the total absorbance AT , while the deuterium lamp provides an estimate of the background absorbance A B . The computer system or processing electronics calculates the difference and reports the background corrected absorbance. Continuum source background correction uses a deuterium lamp to obtain an estimate of the background absorbance. A HCL obtains the total absorbance. The corrected absorbance is then obtained by calculating the difference between the two. Smith-Hieftje background correction Smith-Hieftje background correction uses a single HCL pulsed with low-current mode obtains the total absorbance, while the background is estimated during the high current pulse. During the low current pulse, the analyte absorbance + the background absorbance is measured. During the high current pulse, the HCL emission line becomes broadened. The centre of the line can be strongly self-absorbed so that much of the line at the analyte wavelength is missing. Hence, during the high current pulse, a good estimate of the background absorbance is obtained. Zeeman Effect background correction Background correction with electrothermal atomizers can be done by the Zeeman effect. Here a magnetic field splits normally degenerate spectral lines into components with different polarization characteristics. Analyte and background absorption can be separated because of their different magnetic and polarization behaviours.