Spectrophotometric, spectrofluorimetric, and potentiometric assays of cetyltrimethylammonium bromide in industrial wastewater samples.

This work deals with spectrophotometric, spectrofluorimetric, and potentiometric analyses of cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB) cationic detergent. The spectrophotometric procedure depends on measuring the absorbance of its binary complex with eosin yellow in Britton-Robinson buffer (pH 4) at Lambda max 547 nm in the range of 2.0-14.0 microg/mL with an accuracy of 100.15 +/- 0.54%. The spectrofluorimetric procedure depends on determining the quenching of the fluorescence intensity of fluorescein dye by CTAB in the presence of borate buffer at Lambda em = 500 nm, Lambda ex = 304 nm, in the range of 2.90-14.50 microg/mL with an accuracy of 99.81 + 0.33%. The electrochemical procedure describes an ionophore-based technique using a graphite sensor to measure 0.036 microg/mL and showed an accuracy of 100.11 +/- 0.61%. The experimental conditions affecting each of the three suggested procedures were studied and optimized. All the developed procedures were validated and satisfactorily applied for the determination of CTAB in industrial wastewater samples.