Manganese is an essential element for human life. It is a cofactor
for several enzymes including kineases, phosphatases and oxidoreductases.
It also plays an important role in the brain [1].However,
it is potentially toxic at higher concentrations. The chronic exposure
to this element can cause a neurodegenerative disease named
manganism with symptoms such as mental and emotional disturbances
and muscle stiffness [1,2]. Manganese is usually present
at trace or ultra-trace levels in various environmental samples.
For example, concentration ranges of manganese in fresh waters
are 0.02–130gL−1 [3]. Therefore, very sensitive methods are
necessary for monitoring this element in water samples. Electrothermal
atomic absorption spectrometry (ETAAS) is a powerful
and well-established technique for this purpose [4]. But the direct
determination of Mn at very low concentrations is often difficult
because of insufficient sensitivity of this technique as well as the
matrix interferences occurring in real samples. For this reason, a
preliminary separation and preconcentration step is often required.