Publications

The use of Differential Scanning Calorimetry (DSC) for the certification of pure Reference Materials

This poster relates to work carried out under project R5 – Purity determination of the NMS Chemical and Biological Metrology programme.

High purity materials with reliable and traceable certified values are essential to carry out high accuracy chemical measurements. The organic purity of a compound is generally certified by combining the results from several analytical techniques, such as high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), gas chromatography (GC) and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). None of these techniques are primary analytical methods and have their own limitations. The combined purity value corrected for moisture, residual solvents and inorganic residue provides the best available estimate of the overall purity of an organic substance.

DSC is a convenient tool for purity assessment as it requires minimal sample preparation, small sample quantities and can be automated.

This poster describes a study which aims to improve the calibration procedure, to validate the instrument for the purity determination of organic substances using existing CRMs and develop an uncertainty budget. This is to ensure that the DSC measurements are traceable to the international system of units (SI).

This poster was presented at the Thermal Methods Group TAC-2009 meeting held in Bath in April 2009.

To download this poster click on the link below (you must be logged in). For further information about topics covered by the poster, please contact the NMS helpdesk at LGC.