Determination of Aluminum Ion Concentration

It is believed that aluminum plays important roles in the pathology of Parkinson s disease, Alzheimer s disease, and diseases related to dialysis [75-77]. Therefore, a simple, well working direct potentiometric method could gain large-scale application in food analysis. For these, a selective electrode is needed. Being a three-valence ion, relatively less sensitivity is expected for a direct potentiometric aluminum measuring method. Unfortunately, a relatively small number of successful attempts have been reported about the fabrication of appropriate ion-selective aluminum electrodes. 

As a promising step in food analysis, post-synthesis aluminated mezoporous zeolite molecular sieve, AlMCM-41, was used as neutral ionophore for the preparation of aluminum ISEs by Arvand and coworkers [78]. They found that the best performing measuring membrane contained 30% PVC, 67% aminophen as a plasticizer, and 3% ionophore. The slope of the linear range of the electrode response was 19.5mV/decade, while the dynamic range reached from 10 to 10 M. Methods were worked out and tested for measuring the Al content of rice, mushroom, potato, and Mg-Al syrup. 

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