Laudatory Speaker: Philippa Ross, B.Sc.

In 1985, Alan L. Gray reported on the first coupling of laser ablation (LA) to ICP-mass spectrometry and looking back to one of his initial concerns, “Because of the transient nature of the signal a scanning instrument is at a disadvantage for quantitative measurements.”, it was clear from the start that improvements would be required at the side of the mass analyzer and detection system, in addition to LA hardware developments.1 Over the years, there was a shift towards the use of deep-UV nanosecond and femtosecond lasers, and the quest for faster ablation cell designs started. State-of-the-art ablation cells generate peak profiles of less than 1 ms duration.2 The development of time-of-flight based ICP-mass spectrometers (ICP-ToF-MS) played a pivotal role in advancing high-speed elemental mapping. In this presentation, fundamental work focused on characterizing the analytical performance of an ArF* excimer-based laser capable of firing pulses up to 1 kHz for elemental mapping at 1,000 pixels/s will be discussed. A proof-of-concept will be presented under the form of quantitative multi-elemental mapping of a chondritic meteorite. Upon firing at low laser energy densities, individual metallic NPs can be released from biological tissue and introduced as intact entities into the ICP. A similar approach can be used as a tool to desorb microplastics from filter substrates. 

References 
[1] A.L. Gray Analyst, 1985, 110, 551–556.
[2] T. Van Acker; S.J.M. Van Malderen; T. Van Helden; C. Stremtan; M. Šala; J.T. van Elteren; F. Vanhaecke Journal of Analytical Atomic Spectrometry, 2021, 36, 1201–1209.