Determination of diacetyl with spectrophotometry and thermal-lens spectrometry

The conditions for the spectrophotometric and thermal-lens determination of diacetyl with creatine and 2-naphthol are proposed. The obtained value of the detection limit for spectrophotometry (at 527 nm), which amounts to 10 ng/mL, is fivefold lower than the existing values of the spectrophotometric determination of diacetyl. The conditions for the thermal-lens determination of diacetyl (λ = 514.5 nm, strength of the inducing radiation: 40 mW) based on the unmodified procedure of spectrophotometric determination were proposed. Along with a fivefold (down to 2 ng/mL) decrease in the detection limit, which is comparable with that for the determination of diacetyl by means of gas chromatography with mass spectrometric detection (detection limit of 0.7 ng/mL), thermal-lens determination is characterized by the enhancement of other performance parameters of the determination. It was shown that, contrary to the case when gas chromatography is used, ethanol does not interfere with both the spectrophotometric and the thermal-lens determination of acetyl. © 2009 Allerton Press, Inc.