Antimony speciation in terrestrial plants. Comparative studies on extraction methods

A suitable method for the extraction of antimony species from plant materials prior to IC-HG-AFS analysis is presented. The extraction efficiency with different extraction systems using various aqueous and aqueous/solvent mixtures was initially evaluated by analysing the Virginia Tobacco Leaves Certified Reference Material. The concentration of antimony extracted was compared with the total antimony content in the plant material measured by HG-AFS after focused microwave-acidic digestion using HNO3 and H2O2. The proposed extraction procedures were applied to antimony speciation in several plants from a natural terrestrial environment impacted by mining activities. End-over-end agitation (4 h) followed by sonication (1 h) extraction using 0.1 mol l(-1) citric acid was found to provide the best extraction efficiency while also giving reliable speciation information. Both inorganic and methylantimony species were found in the extractable portion of some terrestrial plants.