Determination of iodide by detection of iodine using gas-diffusion flow injection and chemiluminescence

This work describes development of a flow injection (FI) system for determination of iodide, based on the chemiluminescence (CL) reaction between iodine and luminol. Iodide in the sample zone is oxidized to iodine. Employment of a gas-diffusion (GD) unit allows for selective detection of the generated CL (425 nm). Preliminary results showed for concentrations of less than 2 mg L−1, that signals were irreproducible and that the calibration was not linear. er to solve these problems, a method of ‘membrane conditioning’ was investigated, in which iodide stream was continuously merged with oxidant to generate I2 that conditioned the GD membrane and tubing. This minimized surface interaction between the active surface and the I2 generated from the samples, thus improving both precision and sensitivity. By employing membrane conditioning, it has been possible to reliably detect concentrations down to 0.1 mg L−1. optimized condition, an excellent linear calibration (r2 = 0.999) was obtained from 0.1 to 1.0 mg L−1. The method was successfully applied to determine iodide in some pharmaceutical products such as potassium iodide tablets and a liquid patent medicine. However, for vitamin tablets, ascorbic acid was found to interfere seriously by causing a negative signal.