Issue 10, 2011

Open ablation cell for LA-ICP-MS investigations of historic objects

Abstract

Laser ablation (LA) of historic objects (glass and ceramic) as well as reference materials (NIST610 and SRM679) was executed in standard closed or home made open ablation cells of different intrinsic volume (c.a. 60 cm3 and 9 cm3 or 4.5 cm3 respectively). Comparative investigations with different ablation cells were carried out with argon as the carrier gas and registration of transient signals during the subsequent multielemental analysis by means of inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS). Open cells allowed direct ablation from surface of historic objects and demonstrated suitability for mapping and quantitative elemental analysis. Resolution of created maps showing distribution of selected elements was improved by using open cells for which the rinse out time of aerosol was noticeably shortened (by a factor of 3) compared to the standard cell. The accuracy of quantitative elemental results obtained for ceramic objects was tested using SRM679 Brick Clay in the form of pressed pellet and was found to be satisfactory. It was demonstrated that the applicability of LA-ICP-MS in archaeometry as well as conservation science could be enhanced by popularization of open cells for the direct ablation from objects, which are too big to fit to standard cells and require strict limitation of sampling.

Graphical abstract: Open ablation cell for LA-ICP-MS investigations of historic objects

Article information

Article type
Technical Note
Submitted
04 May 2011
Accepted
13 Jun 2011
First published
08 Aug 2011

J. Anal. At. Spectrom., 2011,26, 2058-2063

Open ablation cell for LA-ICP-MS investigations of historic objects

B. Wagner and W. Jędral, J. Anal. At. Spectrom., 2011, 26, 2058 DOI: 10.1039/C1JA10137D

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