This paper outline a new, simple, selective and sensitive spectrophotometric
procedure for the quantitative determination of iron. The bidentate ligand of 2-
(1-Acetyl-2-oxopropyl)acrylonitrile has been synthesized ,and determined by
elemental ana
lysis and infrared spectroscopy. The compound reacts with
Fe(III) to form a colored complex with an absorption maxima at 400nm and
490nm. The effect of pH, amount of reagent, time, temperature and the
interference of many ions on the Fe (III) determination was also estimated.
Beer's law is obeyed for iron concentration in the range (0.23- 4.48μg/ ml) for
spectrophotometric method and (0.56-8.4) for extraction spectrophotometric
method. The molar absorptivity was in the rang 2.70x104-3.46 x 104 L.mol-1cm-1.
Sandall's sensitivity was found to be 1.61 x 10 -3 – 2.07 x 10-3 μg . cm-2.
The RSDs for both spectrophotometric and extraction spectrophotometric
methods were below 3%. The analytical error SD/√n was within 0.021. The
technique has been applied to the determination of iron in alloys and in
pharmaceutical preparations.