APPLICATIONS OF LASER-ABLATION INDUCTIVELY-COUPLED PLASMA-MASS SPECTROMETRY TO THE DETERMINATION OF ENVIRONMENTAL CONTAMINANTS IN CALCIFIEDBIOLOGICAL STRUCTURES
Rd. Evans et al., APPLICATIONS OF LASER-ABLATION INDUCTIVELY-COUPLED PLASMA-MASS SPECTROMETRY TO THE DETERMINATION OF ENVIRONMENTAL CONTAMINANTS IN CALCIFIEDBIOLOGICAL STRUCTURES, Journal of analytical atomic spectrometry, 9(9), 1994, pp. 985-989
Many calcified biological structures record changes in organism exposu
re to environmental contamination. Preservation of spatial and tempora
l information on historical changes in contaminants within a structure
demands direct analysis of the solid samples. Laser ablation sampling
(LAS) is a technique which offers the potential to undertake such ana
lyses. This paper outlines changes made to hardware and software of a
commercial sampler to allow auto sampling of solid materials in conjun
ction with inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS). The
potential of LAS coupled to ICP-MS for spatially resolved analysis is
demonstrated with measurements on several different types of calcified
biological structures which incorporate trace metal contaminants at t
he time of deposition. The results indicate that changes in concentrat
ion in several trace metals are detectable and that the changes most l
ikely relate to changes in exposure.