A dispersive liquid–liquid microextraction technique for the determination of 210Pb in drinking water samples

A radioanalytical method has been developed for determination of 210Pb in drinking water samples. It is based on the conversion of inorganic lead into tetraethyl lead using an alkylating reagent followed by a dispersive liquid–liquid microextraction of tetraethyl lead to toluene. Method performance for selectivity, interference, minimum detectable activity, minimum quantifiable concentration, relative error, and relative standard deviation is considered to be satisfactory for determination of 210Pb in drinking water for radiological protection. The method presented here offers a significant improvement in sample turnaround time (<7 h) compared to the existing analytical methods that take 2–6 days.