Atomic spectrometry update. Advances in atomic emission, absorption and fluorescence spectrometry and related techniques

This review period has seen the continuation of the trend towards the publication of many routine applications rather than novel instrumental or methodological advances, particularly for FAAS, ICP-AES and ETAAS. Likewise there has been a marked decrease in the number of novel publications on fundamental studies, chemometrics and solid sampling. This reflects the maturity of atomic emission and absorption methods of analysis, and possibly the move towards mass spectrometry as the preferred method of analysis. New approaches and variations on existing themes for sample introduction and vapour generation continue to be a fertile area of research, but incremental rather than revolutionary advances are the order of the day. Speciation analysis still attracts some considerable interest, particularly for the determination of As, Se and Sb compounds. One other area which remains quite strong is LIBS, with several novel instrumental and fundamental papers appearing.