Factorial design for the response exploration of a flow injection system.

A factorial composite design was employed for the exploration of the response as a function of the flow rate and length of the dispersion coil of a flow injection system employed for on-line dilution and determination of copper by flame-AAS. For this purpose, an empirical response function (RF), which takes into account the peak height and the response time, was employed to evaluate the response. This RF was modified using the coefficient of variation in order to discriminate not only for high absorbance and adequate response time, but also for the best precision.