Page 9 - Analityka 3/2015

Miniature helium rotating NAUKA
plasma sources

NEW, PROMISING TOOL FOR ANALYTICAL SPECTROSCOPY

There have been many miniature plasma sources invented so far, and some of them may compete with widely
applied Inductively Coupled Plasma in analytical atomic spectroscopy. However, newly designed rotating plasma
sources present distinctive and original solution in that matter. Plasma generated in these sources is disc shaped,
symmetrically stretched between 3 to 10 electrodes. There are two basic types of rotating plasma sources – plas-
mas sustained in rotating electromagnetic field (rotating capacitively coupled plasmas) and digitally controlled
plasmas (kHz pulse-operated plasmas). Despite low power and volume, rotating plasma tends to be very stable
and immune to water aerosol loading (plasma can take 150 mg/ml sample load). Further studies have shown that
plasma geometry in these sources remained stable within long time period and can be shaped by changing the
number of electrodes and their mutual position. Thereby these sources can be easily coupled to other analytical
techniques such as gas chromatography or lab-on-chip systems.

ANALITYKA – NUMER 3, ROK (XVI) 2015 15