Spectrophotometric Determination of Copper and Nickel in Marine Brown Algae after Preconcentration with Surfactant Assisted Dispersive Liquid-Liquid Microextraction

A simple, fast and effective pre-concentration method for the determination of Cu (copper) and Ni (nickel) was developed using a Surfactant Assisted Dispersive Liquid-Liquid Microextraction (SA-DLLME) coupled by UV-Vis spectrophotometry in marine brown algae. The complexing agent was 1- (2- pyridylazo) – 2 - naphthol (PAN).The effects of various experimental parameters in the extraction step including type and volume of extraction solvent, type and amount of surfactant, ionic strength, extraction time, pH, amount of ligand, and centrifugation time and rate were investigated. Under optimal experimental conditions, good linearity was observed in the range of 0.1-100.0 µg/Lfor analytes by limits of detection of 0.031 and 0.033 µg/Lfor Ni and Cu, respectively. The proposed procedure was used for the analysis of Ni and Cu in marine brown algae. Good recoveries for spiked samples in the range of 100-118 % were obtained. Using this technique, metals content in algae from Chabahar Bay (Southeast Iran) were detected in the range of 12.80- 39.46 µg/L