Determination of chromium(VI) by surface plasmon field-enhanced resonance light scattering.

A surface plasmon-enhanced resonance light scattering method has been developed. The method features strong light scattering but very weak background, and after incorporating with selective sample extraction and ion-association complexation using rhodamine B and KI as reactants, it could selectively determine Cr(VI) in both of standard and real samples, reaching a limit of detection down to 20 nM which is about 40-fold as sensitive as flame atomic absorption spectrometry and 140-fold as sensitive as fluorescent spectroscopy. Its linear working range was found in between 40 and 320 nM, with a relative standard deviation of peak height at <3% (n = 5) and recovery between 94.8-104.9%. In theory, the method is applicable to the analysis of all substances able to produce or destroy I2.