We have a request from a company called the solution Makers. This company prepares and sells
certified standard solutions for use in accredited laboratories worldwide. They are especially known for
their high-quality atomic absorption standard solutions widely used to calibrate atomic spectroscopy
instruments as well as other instruments. The chemicals they use to prepare these solutions are
purchased from The Inorganic Chemical Company of North America (ICCNA).
The solutions Makers have noticed that recent shipments of solid Iron(III) chloride and nickel(II)
nitrate purchased from ICCNA to make 100 ppm solutions of iron and nickel appeared to be a slightly
different color compared to the same chemicals purchased earlier. They are suspicious that these
chemicals are “out-of-spec” (meaning they do not meet the specifications required by law) due to
contaminant. However, before they can return the chemicals back to ICCNA and claim that the
chemicals are out-of-spec, they must carry out an analysis to make a conclusion. Our purpose is to
simply discover whether or not there is a colored contaminant present. We do not need to identify the
name of the contaminants if any. The Solution Makers have given us samples of both the clean
iron(III) chloride and nickel(II) nitrate and also the chemicals suspected of being contaminated