A combination of dynamic measurement protocol and advanced data treatment to resolve the mixtures of chemically similar analytes with potentiometric multisensor system

Effect of the stability of 1,3-bis(diphenylphosphoryl)-2-oxapropane complexes on the separation of lanthanide ions and their detection

Phosphoryl podands of neutral type with a flexible ethylene glycol chain and diphenylphosphorylmethyl end groups are known for their complexation properties towards various cations. In this work, the complexation process between 1,3-bis(diphenylphosphoryl)-2-oxapropane (L) and lanthanide ions was studied. Namely, the stability constants of lanthanide complexes with L in acetonitrile were estimated by the method of spectrophotometric titration. It was found that the stability constants of Ln3+ complexes with L increase in the lanthanide series, which is consistent with the extraction and ion-selective properties of L. The extraction ability of L and this ligand in the presence of ionic liquids (ILs) such as methyltrioctylammonium nitrate (MTOAN) and bis[(trifluoromethyl)sulfonyl]imide 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium (C4mimTf2N) was studied. It was found that in the presence of ILs, L extracts the elements of the yttrium subgroup of lanthanides much better than those of the cerium subgroup: SFLu/Ce(L-MTOAN) = 2.29; SFLu/Ce(L-C4mimTf2N) = 110.38. The use of the L-C4mimTf2N mixture in the processes of lanthanide separation into subgroups is much more efficient than the use of L without the addition of ILs or the use of the L-MTOAN mixture. The ion-selective properties of L towards Ln3+ ions were studied. Podand L exhibits potentiometric selectivity to Lu3+ ions.

Plutonium (IV) Quantification in Technologically Relevant Media Using Potentiometric Sensor Array

The quantification of plutonium in technological streams during spent nuclear fuel (SNF) reprocessing is an important practical task that has to be solved to ensure the safety of the process. Currently applied methods are tedious, time-consuming and can hardly be implemented in on-line mode. A fast and simple quantitative plutonium (IV) analysis using a potentiometric sensor array based on extracting agents is suggested in this study. The response of the set of specially designed PVC-plasticized membrane sensors can be related to plutonium content in solutions simulating real SNF-reprocessing media through multivariate regression modeling, providing 30% higher precision of plutonium quantification than optical spectroscopy.

Bioelectronic tongues: New trends and applications in water and food analysis

Over the last years, there has been an increasing demand for fast, highly sensitive and selective methods of analysis to meet new challenges in environmental monitoring, food safety and public health. In response to this demand, biosensors have arisen as a promising tool, which offers accurate chemical data in a timely and cost-effective manner. However, the difficulty to obtain sensors with appropriate selectivity and sensitivity for a given analyte, and to solve analytical problems which do not require the quantification of a certain analyte, but an overall effect on a biological system (e.g. toxicity, quality indices, provenance, freshness, etc.), led to the concept of electronic tongues as a new strategy to tackle these problems. In this direction, to improve the performance of electronic tongues, and thus to spawn new application fields, biosensors have recently been incorporated to electronic tongue arrays, leading to what is known as bioelectronic tongues. Bioelectronic tongues provide superior performance by combining the capabilities of electronic tongues to derive meaning from complex or imprecise data, and the high selectivity and specificity of biosensors. The result is postulated as a tool that exploits chemometrics to solve biosensors' interference problems, and biosensors to solve electronic tongues' selectivity problems. The review presented herein aims to illustrate the capabilities of bioelectronic tongues as analytical tools, especially suited for screening analysis, with particular emphasis in water analysis and the characterization of food and beverages. After briefly reviewing the key concepts related to the design and principles of electronic tongues, we provide an overview of significant contributions to the field of bioelectronic tongues and their future perspectives.