Determination of 20 Trace Impurity Elements in High-Purity Niobium by Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry

The high-purity niobium sample (0.050 0 g) was dissolved in the mixture of some water, 1 mL of HF and 2 mL of HNO₃, which were added slowly, by heating at low temperature, and then the solution was cooled to room temperature, and made its volume up to 100 mL. The 20 trace impurity elements in above solution were determined by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS), and internal standard method was used for quantitative analysis. As shown by the results, the detection limits (3s) of 20 elements were found in the range of 0.005-0.20 μg·g^-1. Values of recovery were found in the range of 95.0%-110%. A niobium ingot sample was analyzed by the proposed method, giving results in consistency with the results found by glow discharge mass spectrometry.