Sensitive flow injection colorimetry of nitrite by catalytic coupling of N-phenyl-p-phenylenediamine with N,N-dimethylaniline.

A rapid, sensitive and selective flow-injection colorimetry method is proposed for the determination of trace amounts of nitrite. It is based on the nitrite's catalytic effect on the oxidative coupling of N-phenyl-p-phenylenediamine with N,N-dimethylaniline to produce a green dye (lambda(max)=735 nm) in the presence of bromate. The change in absorbances of the dye were monitored in continuos flow mode. Linear calibration curves were obtained for the nitrite concentration range 2.0-100 ng ml(-1). The proposed method had a low detection limit (0.6 ng ml(-1)) and high sample throughput (approximately 30 samples h(-1)). The RSD for 10 and 50 ng ml(-1) nitrite were 2.4 and 1.3% (n=10), respectively. The method has been successfully applied to the determination of nitrite in river water samples.