Mercury Analysis in Water – How to Stabilise Mercury in Water

Posted by: chrisball | Posted on: March 27th, 2012 | 0 Comments

Nitric acid is commonly used to stabilise trace metals however it is not particularly helpful for mercury at low levels. Halogens such as chloride or bromide are more preferable in that they form a very stable complex with mercury therefore to keep mercury in the solution. Acidify your sample with hydrochloric acid is one of the easiest way to stabilise your water samples. If you combine hydrochloric acid and bromine which forms BrCl in the solution, it not only stabilise mercury, also digest the sample at the same time. We would recommend to use these two methods to preserve mercury in your water sample.