Improvements in RIMS Isotopic Precision: Application to in situ atom-limited analyses

Journal Article · Tue Mar 17 04:00:00 EDT 2009 · AIP Conference Proceedings

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1063/1.3115614· OSTI ID:21293410

Levine, J; Stephan, T ^[1]; Savina, M; Pellin, M ^[2]

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1. Department of the Geophysical Sciences, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL (United States)
2. Chicago Center for Cosmochemistry, Chicago, IL (United States)

Resonance ionization mass spectrometry offers high sensitivity and elemental selectivity in microanalysis, but the isotopic precision attainable by this technique has been limited. Here we report instrumental modifications to improve the precision of RIMS isotope ratio measurements. Special attention must be paid to eliminating pulse-to-pulse variations in the time-of-flight mass spectrometer through which the photoions travel, and resonant excitation schemes must be chosen such that the resonance transitions can substantially power-broadened to cover the isotope shifts. We report resonance ionization measurements of chromium isotope ratios with statistics-limited precision better than 1%.

• OSTI ID: 21293410
• Journal Information: AIP Conference Proceedings, Journal Name: AIP Conference Proceedings Journal Issue: 1 Vol. 1104; ISSN APCPCS; ISSN 0094-243X
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CHEMISTRY
ABLATION
ACCURACY
ATOMS
CHROMIUM ISOTOPES
EXCITATION
IONIZATION
ISOTOPE RATIO
MICROANALYSIS
MODIFICATIONS
MULTI-ELEMENT ANALYSIS
PULSES
QUANTITATIVE CHEMICAL ANALYSIS
RESONANCE IONIZATION MASS SPECTROSCOPY
SENSITIVITY
SPECTRAL SHIFT
TIME-OF-FLIGHT METHOD
VARIATIONS