Application of NAA and related analytical facilities at MINT, Malaysia

The Analytical Chemistry Laboratory of MINT equipped with analytical equipments to analyse trace chemical components that are important for various field of studies particularly the environmental studies. Even though we are equipped with various analytical technique, we consider the NAA still playing very important role in the analysis of inorganic trace chemical contents in the environmental samples. The reasons due to advantages offered by the nuclear analytical technique such as of it ability to be carried out instrumentally, for a relatively small quantity of samples with good sensitivity. We analysed slightly more than 2,000 samples peryear and about 60% of the samples analysed entirely by the NAA technique. We believed the number of samples analysed will further increase if we apply proper QC/QA procedure to enhance the quality of generated data. To achieved this objective we participated in the IAEA/RCA regional program entitled Quality Assurance and Quality Control (QA/QC) in Nuclear Analytical Technique. In addition to the QC/QA program, we are also will further equipped our analytical systems with additional gamma spectrometer systems and automatic sample changer. It is envisaged that the additional equipments will be made available next year. The additional equipment will enable us to analyse more samples. (author)