New Mass Spectrometers for NBC & Environmental Characterization

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The goal of this project is to build and calibrate two new mass spectrometer (MS) prototypes: 1) A small, high-impact tolerant rotating field MS (RFMS) that can measure gases and fluids in a small, hand-held package, allowing this device to be used for real-time analyses in the field, and 2) An extremely high-resolution multi-bounce time of flight (MBTOF) MS of moderate size, but with thecapability of measuring a wide range of light isotopes in addition to specific heavyisotopes. For the first (RFMS) prototype, this existing design suffers from signal to noise (SNR) issues associated with the ionizer or the momentum filter. The team will use off-the-shelf (OTS) ionizers to track down the issue and correct the problem. For the second system, the existing design will be calibrated against a wide range of chemical compounds, to illustrate readiness for measurements. Specific tasks for the second (MBTOF) prototype will include: integration of a higher speed and sensitivity ETP Hybrid MCP-discrete dynode detector appropriate for isotope measurements, and calibration and sensitivity testing against a suite of chemical compounds. The project investigates the fundamental ion physics associated with new implementations of sophisticated mass spectrometers that could be used in a wide range of scientific and commercial disciplines, in a wide range of environments, from ice boreholes that reveal the history of climate to effluent gas monitoring stations.