Abstract:

Digestion with dillute nitric acid followed by inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) with
dynamic reaction cell (DRC) was used to determine the levels of cadmium, mercury, lead and chromium in alcoholic
drinks. The optimal levels of nitric acid concentration (volume fraction), temperature, time and sample dilution factor for
the digestion process were found to be 50%, 95 ℃, 1 h and 5, respectively. Further investigations were also carried out
into reduction of matrix interferences, eliminiation of mercury adsorption and optimization of instrumental conditions. The
contents of cadmium, mercury, lead, chromium in red wine, white wine, liquor, beer and rice wine was determined by the
presented method. The limits of detection for cadmium, mercury, lead, chromium were found to be 0.01, 0.01, 0.08 μg/L,
and 0.03 μg/L, respectively. The precision of this method was in the range of 0.48% to 12.87% (RSD), and recovery rates
ranged from 89.6% to 106.5%. This method was efficient, sensitive, accurate and suitable for large-scale determination.

Key words: dynamic reaction cell, inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (ICP-MS), cadmium, mercury, lead, chromium, alcoholic drinks