TY - JOUR A1 - Vogl, Jochen A1 - Kipphardt, Heinrich A1 - Richter, Silke A1 - Bremser, Wolfram A1 - Arvizu Torres, M. A1 - Lara Manzano, J. A1 - Buzoianu, M. A1 - Hill, S. A1 - Petrov, P. A1 - Goenaga-Infante, H. A1 - Sargent, M. A1 - Fisicaro, P. A1 - Labarraque, G. A1 - Zhou, T. A1 - Turk, G. C. A1 - Winchester, M. A1 - Miura, T. A1 - Methven, B. A1 - Sturgeon, R. A1 - Jährling, R. A1 - Rienitz, O. A1 - Mariassy, M. A1 - Hankova, Z. A1 - Sobina, E. A1 - Krylov, A. I. A1 - Kustikov, Y. A. A1 - Smirnov, V. V. T1 - Establishing comparability and compatibility in the purity assessment of high purity zinc as demonstrated by the CCQM-P149 intercomparison N2 - For the first time, an international comparison was conducted on the determination of the purity of a high purity element. Participants were free to choose any analytical approach appropriate for their institute’s applications and services. The material tested was a high purity zinc, which had earlier been assessed for homogeneity and previously used in CCQM-K72 for the determination of six defined metallic impurities. Either a direct metal assay of the Zn mass fraction was undertaken by EDTA titrimetry, or an indirect approach was used wherein all impurities, or at least the major ones, were determined and their sum subtracted from ideal purity of 100 %, or 1 kg/kg. Impurity assessment techniques included glow discharge mass spectrometry, inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry and carrier gas hot extraction/combustion analysis. Up to 91 elemental impurities covering metals, non-metals and semi-metals/metalloids were quantified. Due to the lack of internal experience or experimental capabilities, some participants contracted external laboratories for specific analytical tasks, mainly for the analysis of non-metals. The reported purity, expressed as zinc mass fraction in the high purity zinc material, showed excellent agreement for all participants, with a relative standard deviation of 0.011 %. The calculated reference value, w(Zn) = 0.999 873 kg/kg, was assigned an asymmetric combined uncertainty of + 0.000025 kg/kg and – 0.000028 kg/kg. Comparability amongst participating metrology institutes is thus demonstrated for the purity determination of high purity metals which have no particular difficulties with their decomposition / dissolution process when solution-based analytical methods are used, or which do not have specific difficulties when direct analysis approaches are used. Nevertheless, further development is required in terms of uncertainty assessment, quantification of non-metals and the determination of purity of less pure elements and/or for those elements suffering difficulties with the decomposition process. KW - Purity assessment KW - Direct metal assay KW - Impurity assessment KW - Non-metal analysis KW - High-purity elements KW - SI-traceability PY - 2018 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1088/1681-7575/aaa677 SN - 1681-7575 SN - 0026-1394 VL - 55 IS - 2 SP - 211 EP - 221 PB - Institute of Physics Publishing CY - Bristol AN - OPUS4-44257 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Matschat, Ralf A1 - Richter, Silke A1 - Vogl, Jochen A1 - Kipphardt, Heinrich T1 - On the way to SI traceable primary transfer standards for amount of substance measurements in inorganic chemical analysis N2 - During its 25 years of existence, the Inorganic Analysis Working Group of the Consultative Committee for Amount of Substance: Metrology in Chemistry and Biology (CCQM IAWG) has achieved much in establishing comparability of measurement results. Impressive work has been done on comparison exercises related to real-world problems in fields such as ecology, food, or health. In more recent attempts, measurements and comparisons were focused on calibration solutions which are the basis of most inorganic chemical measurements. This contribution deals with the question of how to achieve full and transparent SI traceability for the values carried by such solutions. Within this framework, the use of classical primary methods (CPMs) is compared to the use of a primary difference method (PDM). PDM is a method with a dual character, namely a metrological method with a primary character, based on the bundling of many measurement methods for individual impurities, which lead to materials with certified content of the main component. As in classical methods, where small corrections for interferences are accepted, in PDM, many small corrections are bundled. In contrast to classical methods, the PDM is universally applicable to all elements in principle. Both approaches can be used to certify the purity (expressed as mass fraction of the main element) of a high-purity material. This is where the metrological need of National Metrology Institutes (NMIs) for analytical methods meet the challenges of analytical methods. In terms of methods, glow discharge mass spectrometry (GMDS) with sufficient uncertainties for sufficiently small impurity contents is particularly noteworthy for the certification of primary transfer standards (PTS), and isotope dilution mass spectrometry (IDMS), which particularly benefits from PTS (back-spikes) with small uncertainties, is particularly noteworthy for the application. The corresponding relative uncertainty which can be achieved using the PDM is very low (< 10−4). Acting as PTS, they represent the link between the material aspect of the primary calibration solutions and the immaterial world of the International System of Units (SI). The underlying concepts are discussed, the current status of implementation is summarised, and a roadmap of the necessary future activities in inorganic analytical chemistry is sketched. It has to be noted that smaller measurement uncertainties of the purity of high-purity materials not only have a positive effect on chemical measurements, but also trigger new developments and findings in other disciplines such as thermometry or materials science. KW - Inorganic chemical analysis KW - Primary transfer standards (PTSs) KW - Traceability KW - Classical primary measurement method (CPM) KW - Primary difference measurement method (PDM) KW - Metrology in chemistry PY - 2023 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:b43-572743 SN - 1618-2642 SN - 1618-2650 VL - 415 SP - 3057 EP - 3071 PB - Springer CY - Berlin AN - OPUS4-57274 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Kazlagić, Anera A1 - Stephan, D. A1 - Ostermann, Markus A1 - Possolo, A. A1 - Vogl, Jochen T1 - Fingerprinting Portland cements by means of 87Sr/86Sr and 143Nd/144Nd isotope ratios and geochemical profiles N2 - This study uses conventional 87Sr/86Sr and 143Nd/144Nd isotope and interelement ratios of Ca, Sr, K, Mn, Mg and Ti as fingerprints for provenancing ordinary Portland cements (OPC). Herein, the first database of Sr and Nd isotope ratios investigated in OPCs, stemming from 29 cement plants located worldwide, was created. The results show that the Sr isotope ratios of OPCs are higher than those of seawater from the observed geological period. The spread of 143Nd/144Nd in OPCs is not as large as the spread for 87Sr/86Sr isotope ratios. However, the combination of both Sr and Nd isotope ratios provides the potential for distinguishing between cements of different production sites. Most of the OPCs investigated have measurable differences in their 87Sr/86Sr and 143Nd/144Nd isotope ratios, which can be employed as a valuable analytical fingerprinting tool. In the case of equivocal results, divisive hierarchical clustering was employed to help overcome this issue. The construction of geochemical profiles allowed the computing of suitably defined distances between cements and clustering them according to their chemical similarity. By applying this methodology, successful fingerprinting was achieved in 27 out of the 29 ordinary Portland cements that were analysed. KW - Elemental fingerprints KW - Geochemistry KW - Portland cement KW - Sr and Nd isotope analysis KW - Statistical analysis PY - 2023 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1680/jadcr.23.00018 SN - 0951-7197 SP - 1 EP - 12 PB - Emerald Publishing Limited AN - OPUS4-57979 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER -