Dielectric barrier discharge plasma atomizer for hydride generation atomic absorption spectrometry-Performance evaluation for selenium

Atomization of selenium hydride in a quartz dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) atomizer was optimized and its performance was compared to that of the externally heated quartz multiatomizer. Argon was found as the best DBD discharge gas employing a flow rate of 75 ml min− 1 Ar while the DBD power was optimized at 14 W. The detection limits reached 0.24 ng ml− 1 Se in the DBD and 0.15 ng ml− 1 Se in the multiatomizer. The tolerance of DBD to interferences is even better than with the multiatomizer.