Investigation of a rapid infrared heating assisted mineralization of soybean matrices for trace element analysis.

A fast sample preparation procedure based on use of infrared (IR) assisted heating for mineralization of soybean derived samples has been developed for their subsequent multielement analysis by inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry (ICP-OES) and flame atomic absorption spectrometry (FAAS). A cold finger was examined for refluxing of acid vapors to determine its impact on efficiency and economy of digestion. The optimized procedure, based on 1 g subsamples, 8 mL of HNO3 (65% w/w) and exposure of the mixture to a 500 W IR source for 5 min without refluxing, permitted accurate determination of all analytes in NIST SRM 1568b (rice flour). Detection limits using ICP-OES were (µg/kg) 97, 1.0, 39, 185, 0.47 and 1200 for Ca, Cu, Fe, K, Mn and P, respectively, and 18 for Zn by FAAS. The IR-assisted digestion approach provided a low cost, easy to use system having great potential for implementation in routine analysis of trace elements in soybean and similar matrices.