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Project 14 (STE)
Title: Factors affecting GD-MS results
Researcher: Antonio Martin
Coordinator: Shiva Technology Europe;
Other partners: UA, RISSP, CUFR, DEG
State of the Art:
DC GD-MS is routinely used in industry, R&D and scientific institutions for trace elemental analysis and material characterization, including new materials of crucial importance for future technologies (e.g. energy sector), but it is often not fully understood how differing material characteristics influence GD characteristics and hence analytical results. It is also very important to know the similarities and differences in performance of various GD-MS instruments and techniques to be able compare and evaluate results fully. New materials are continually presented for analysis and there is thus a constant need to investigate and improve GD-MS analytical results. Surface and coating characterization and depth profiling is a very important and growing part of GD-MS applications.
schematics of HR GD MS system
Objective and Innovation:
Commercial dc GD-MS instruments (Thermo VG9000 and Thermo Element GD) will be used in this project. A significant volume of experimental data on a wide range of materials is available and easy to obtain in a commercial and industrial environment. The following topics of high importance and interest will be studied:
- Influence of boundary conditions (geometry, material, design etc. ) on analytical results
- Ni super-alloys and
- other alloys with relatively low heat conductivity will be of primary interest.
- Differences and similarities between various GD source designs from analytical results point of view
- response to various sample geometries
- especially small and atypical shapes.
- Depth profiling including de-convolution techniques of crater shapes will be studied
- as function of GD conditions and
- material properties,
- to optimize a crater profile,
- again focusing on Ni super alloys and various industrial coatings.
- Simple de-convolution procedures will be refined to improve depth information.
