We report a comprehensive analysis of the acquisition-related sources of uncertainty for internally and externally standardized qNMR experiments. The impacts of major instrument- and sample-related sources of biases and uncertainties are quantified where possible, and the validity of correction and calibration techniques are also discussed. The application of uncertainty budgets for qNMR is well established for simple, internally standardized systems, but the model is incomplete and does not allow for the additional biases and sources of uncertainty that arise from spectrum complexity and external standardization. This report considers the additional contributions to the uncertainty budget that need to be considered to ensure SI traceability of measurement across a wider range of analytes and NMR methodologies.

Reference materials certified for purity are essential to ensure harmonization of analytical measurements. LGC is currently certifying these materials using an indirect multi-method approach quantifying impurities: Related substances using high-performance liquid chromatography, gas chromatography (GC), differential scanning calorimetry; Residual solvents using headspace GC coupled to mass spectrometry; Inorganic content using ashing, acid digest ion couple plasma mass spectrometry or thermogravimetric analysis; Water using oven coulometric Karl Fischer/direct addition coulometric Karl Fischer. Related substances are not straightforward to quantify without an appropriate standard due to possible difference in response factor for the impurity relative to the main compound. In this article, existing LGC RMs certified for purity were purified further using semi-preparative HPLC. These ultra-purified organic substances were virtually free of related substances making their purity assessment faster and more straightforward, i.e., no need to identify impurities and subsequently quantify them. After characterization, these ultra-purified standards were used as calibrants to determine directly the mass fraction of the analyte in the original CRM using exact matching single-point HPLC calibration. This new approach opens the possibility of certifying the purity of low purity substances with a relative small uncertainty without the need of identifying the impurities present in the sample.

The use of a replicated Latin square design for reference material homogeneity assessment is illustrated by application to a homogeneity study of eight high-purity organic materials certified for melting point. The design controlled for both a three-level location effect and a run effect. Variance components were extracted using mixed effects modelling using a restricted maximum likelihood method. An alternative classical ANOVA calculation is also given. The effect of appreciable numerical rounding by the instrument software was investigated and shown to be acceptable for the particular example. Estimation of the scale of location and run effects showed that in this example the location effect was both statistically and practically significant, while the run effect was not statistically significant at the 95% level of confidence. The design allowed unbiased estimates of between-unit variances in the presence of both interfering effects.