Assessment of laser ablation and sector field inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry for elemental analysis of solid samples

Abstract

Coupling laser ablation and inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) creates a technique which is capable of producing isotopic and elemental analyses of solid materials quickly and with a minimum of sample preparation. The instrument most often coupled with a laser ablation system features a quadrupole mass analyzer to resolve the component elements and isotopes. Other instrument designs employing electro-magnetic sector analyzers which have higher ion transmission efficiency and greater resolution capabilities to those found in traditional quadrupole instruments are also available. In this work we couple a laser ablation system to a sector field ICP-MS and illustrate that analysis of solid materials is possible. We will demonstrate that detection limits of low ppt levels are possible for a ‘bulk’ analysis whilst maintaining data precision of <10% for a large number of elements across the mass range. And finally, this work will show that single shot ‘feature’ analysis is possible with detection limits of below 10 ppb for a subset of elements, at precisions of <1%.