Performance evaluation of oxygen adsorbents using negative corona discharge-ion mobility spectrometry

•Analysis of oxygen using negative corona discharge-ion mobility spectrometry was investigated for the first time.•Novel designed point-in-cylinder geometry was used to establish the corona discharge without interferences of negative ions.•The method was utilized to evaluate the performance of some synthesized oxygen scavengers.

Trace amounts of oxygen was determined using negative corona discharge as an ionization source for ion mobility spectrometry. A point-in-cylinder geometry with novel design was used to establish the corona discharge without interferences of negative ions such as NOX−. The desirable background spectrum shows only electrons peak, providing the instrument capable of trace analysis of oxygen in gaseous samples. The limit of detection and linear dynamic range with high coefficient of determination (r2 = 0.9997), were obtained for oxygen as 8.5 and 28-14204 ppm, respectively. The relative standard deviations of the method for intraday and interday were obtained 4 and 11%, respectively. The satisfactory results revealed the ability of the negative corona discharge ion mobility spectrometry for investigating the performance of synthesized oxygen adsorbents in nitrogen streams. Two oxygen scavengers of MnO and Cu powder were prepared and the optimum temperature of the reactor containing MnO and Cu powder were obtained as 180 and 230 °C, respectively. Due to higher lifetime of copper powder, it was selected as the oxygen scavenger and some parameters such as: the type of adsorbent support, the size of adsorbent particles, and the amount of copper were studied for preparation of more efficient oxygen adsorbent.

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