A micro-plate colorimetric assay for rapid determination of trace zinc in animal feed, pet food and drinking water by ion masking and statistical partitioning correction.

A new micro-plate colorimetric assay was developed for rapid determination of zinc in animal feed, pet food and drinking water. Zinc ion was extracted from sample by trichloroacetic acid and then reacted with 2-(5-Bromo-2-pyridylazo)-5-[N-propyl-N-(3-sulfopropyl)amino]phenol (5-Br-PAPS) to form a Zn-PAPS complex to be detected by a micro-plate reader at 552 nm. An ion masking formula including salicylaldoxime, deferoxamine and sodium citrate were screened and applied to exclude the interference from other heavy metals and a partitioning correction approach was proposed to eliminate the matrix effect derived from feed sample. The entire procedure can be completed within 40 min and the detection range was 0.038-8.0 μg mL-1 zinc in buffer solution. Moreover, the analysis in real samples revealed the consistency of results by this assay and those by atomic absorption spectrometry analysis. These features highlighted the possibility for this proposed assay to be used for rapid determination of zinc in complex samples.