Analytical Sciences

Novel Sensitive Spectrophotometric Method for the Trace Determination of Cyanide in Industrial Effluent

Padmarajaiah NAGARAJA,*  Mattighatta S. HEMANTHA KUMAR,** Hemmige S. YATHIRAJAN,* and Jainara S. PRAKASH*

*Department of Studies in Chemistry, University of Mysore, Manasagangotri, Mysore-570 006, India
**Department of Studies in Environmental Sciences, University of Mysore, Manasagangotri, Mysore-570 006, India

The high toxicity of the cyanide ion at low concentration necessitates its analysis in a variety of environmental samples with a very low cyanide content. A new sensitive spectrophotometric method has been developed for the trace determination of cyanide with ninhydrin (NH) in an alkaline medium. Beer's law is obeyed in the range of cyanide concentration 0.04 - 0.24 ug cm^-3, and the molar absorptivity at 590 nm is 2.20 x 10⁵ dm³ mol^-1 cm^-1. The Sandell's sensitivity of the product is 0.000118 ug cm^-2. The optimum reaction conditions and other important analytical parameters have been investigated. The results obtained by using the proposed method for environmental samples agree well with those obtained by the Aldridge standard method.

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