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Updated: Aug 23, 2026

An Atmospheric Pressure Plasma Setup to Investigate the Reactive Species Formation
Published on: November 3, 2016
Some trends in the development of microplasmas for spectrochemical analysis
José A C Broekaert1, Volker Siemens
1Institute for Inorganic and Applied Chemistry, University of Hamburg, Martin-Luther-King-Platz 6, 20146 Hamburg, Germany. jose.broekaert@chemie.uni-hamburg.de
Abstract:
The development of microplasmas for spectrochemical analysis by optical methods is discussed. Recent achievements in miniaturization are highlighted, especially for three types of plasmas, namely high-frequency plasmas, dc-discharges and microwave plasmas. The potentials of each of these groups of plasmas as sources for atomic emission spectrometry are discussed. Literature citations and experiments indicate that the plasmas are also very useful as atom reservoirs for atomic absorption spectrometry. Methods of sampling, including feeding with gas chromatography effluents, the use of electrothermal vaporization, and the evolution of gaseous species (as shown for the case of Hg vapor), are discussed as prominent interfaces to make use of these sources for elemental analysis.
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