Figures of merit in multivariate calibration. Determination of four pesticides in water by flow injection analysis and spectrophotometric detection

The accuracy, trueness and determination limit of a flow injection analysis (FIA) method are evaluated in the simultaneous determination of the pesticides Carbaryl (RYL), Carbofurane (CBF), Propoxur (PPX) and Isoprocarb (IPC) in water by multicomponent analysis. Calibration is based both on the spectra of artificially made samples according to the experimental design theory and the spectra of pure pesticides. Prediction errors in the range 0.1–1.4 evaluated as RMSEP are obtained. The absence of bias is evaluated from the joint confidence interval test for the regression line obtained from measured and predicted concentrations taking into account errors in both axes. Multivariate determination limits were found to be between 0.03 and 1.0 ppm.