Two variant manifolds of a flow injection analysis (FIA) system are
described for the determination
of urea content in milks. This determination consists of the
enzymatic reaction of urea with urease
in which ammonium ion is formed. Ammonium is converted to ammonia
by adding a NaOH solution
and then led to a gas diffusion unit in which it diffuses to an
acceptor channel (Tris/HCl, pH 7.5).
Here, it is reconverted to ammonium ion and determined by a
tubular configuration electrode
sensitive to this ion. One of the FIA manifolds is based on the
merging zones technique, whereas
the other uses an immobilized enzyme. The results obtained were
compared with those given by
the Boehringer UV test and by the Official Method of Analysis of the
Association of Official Analytical
Chemists (AOAC) which can be applied to animal feed and adapted to the
matrix studied. The
relative deviation was less than 5%, and the precision of the
developed methodologies considering
RDS (%) was always less than 2%.
Keywords: Ion-selective electrodes; milk; urea; immobilized enzyme; merging
zones