Extractive Separation and Spectrophotometric Determination of Traces of Ruthenium from Mixtures Containing Excess Platinum Group Metals

Abstract A highly selective, sensitive, and rapid method has been developed for the spectrophotometric determination of ruthenium with 5-chloro-2-hydroxythiobenzhydrazide after extraction into molten naphthalene. Ruthenium was determined in the range 1.2–4.5 ppm. The complex was stable for more than 12 h with molar absorptivity of 1.516 × 104 L mol−1 cm−1 and detection limit of 0.0066 ppm. The method was found to be selective for ruthenium in the presence of a large number of diverse ions. Ruthenium was determined in various synthetic mixtures. The method permits the sequential separation and determination of ruthenium, osmium, and platinum from their mixtures.