Rapid Determination of Cadmium in Rice by Portable Dielectric Barrier Discharge-Atomic Emission Spectrometer

Abstract In this work, a home-made portable dielectric barrier discharge-atomic emission spectrometer (DBD-AES) was explored to the determination of heavy metal in foodstuffs. A rapid and simple method was developed for Cd determination in rice based on this instrument. Rice was pretreated with diluted acid dissolution without complex operations and apparatus. The detection time by DBD-AES is about 3 min and the total analysis time for rice sample is within 11 min. The effects of some key experiment parameters were investigated. The limit of detection was 11.9 μg kg-1 for Cd in rice, much lower than the maximum allowable level established by EC (200 μg kg-1). The practical performance of this method was demonstrated by analyzing real and CRM rice samples. With the portability of DBD-AES, the method is suitable for rapid and in-field analysis of Cd in rice. It will be a useful tool for the routine analysis of rice.