Special Projects at RC Optical Systems...
Laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS)...
Laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) is a type of atomic emission spectroscopy which utilizes a highly energetic laser pulse as the excitation source. LIBS can analyze any matter regardless of its physical state, be it solid, liquid or gas. Even slurries, aerosols, gels, and more can be readily investigated. Because all elements emit light when excited to sufficiently high temperatures, LIBS can detect all elements, limited only by the power of the laser as well as the sensitivity and wavelength range of the spectrograph & detector. Basically LIBS makes use of optical emission spectrometry and is to this extent very similar to arc/spark emission spectroscopy.
LIBS operates by focusing the laser onto a small area at the surface of the specimen; when the laser is discharged it ablates a very small amount of material, in the range of nanograms to picograms, which instantaneously generates a plasma plume with temperatures of about 10,000–20,000 K. At these temperatures, the ablated material dissociates (breaks down) into excited ionic and atomic species. During this time, the plasma emits a continuum of radiation which does not contain any useful information about the species present, but within a very small timeframe the plasma expands at supersonic velocities and cools. At this point the characteristic atomic emission lines of the elements can be observed. The delay between the emission of continuum radiation and characteristic radiation is in the order of 10 µs, this is why it is necessary to temporally gate the detector. Courtesy of Wikipedia
RCOS has manufactured numerous LIBS telescopes ranging from the 10 inch f/9 to the 20 inch f/8. These instruments act as the receiver and have a range of 10 meters to 2 kilometers.