Analysis of high purity antimony by glow discharge quadrupole mass spectrometry

Characterization of a high-purity antimony sample for its trace and ultratrace level impurities has been carried out using GD-QMS. Relative sensitivity factor (RSF) values generated from the analysis of NIST standard reference materials (Low Alloy Steel SRM 1761 and SRM 1762) were used to compute the concentrations. These RSF values were validated through the analysis of NIST Low Alloy Steel SRM 1766. The impurity levels determined through GD-QMS were cross-validated with other solution-based techniques, namely ICP-QMS, ICP-OES, and GFAAS. Good agreement was observed for many elements where interferences were not noted.