Spectroscopy of laser-induced plasmas: an interdisciplinary research program for the 21st Century

等离子体是含有自由电子、离子和原子的高温气体。 由这些等离子体发出的光包含关于哪些原子和分子构成等离子体的信息。 当一个强大的激光脉冲聚焦到一些目标材料上一个非常紧密的点时，激光脉冲的难以置信的能量将材料一个原子一个原子地撕裂，产生一个微型等离子体，看起来像一个小的火花塞火花。 因为它是由激光产生的，我们称之为激光诱导等离子体（LIP）。 LIP相对容易创建和控制，并且可以在几乎任何可以想象的材料上创建，这使得它成为一个非常强大和有吸引力的分析工具，用于快速轻松地确定未知目标的组成。 通过向含有细菌的样本发射激光，我可以快速确定细菌的原子组成，从而唯一地识别它。这种近实时检测和识别细菌病原体的能力在人类生活的许多方面都很重要，包括临床医学和医院，执法和第一反应社区，食品和饮料卫生，以及饮用水/游泳水的清洁和安全。因此，它有可能在生活的许多方面影响所有加拿大人。LIP也是一个完美的实验室环境，可以制造不寻常元素的奇异离子，然后可以测量它们独特的原子特性。 这些信息对于天文学家和天体物理学家来说至关重要，他们可以在来自遥远恒星的光线中看到这些元素。当我们进行这些类型的测量时，我们称之为“实验室天体物理学”，这些测量将使加拿大和世界各地的科学家受益。 LIPs在工业、制造业、环境监测和基础科学（仅举几个领域）中的应用众多，并且每天都在增长。 通过在温莎培训高素质的人员，我们正在培养加拿大科学家和研究人员在开发这一令人兴奋的新科学技术方面发挥主导作用，并能够设计、建造和利用下一代高科技设备。

Plasmas are high-temperature gases that contain free electrons, ions, and atoms. The light emitted by these plasmas contains information about which atoms and molecules comprise the plasma. When a powerful pulse of laser light is focused to a very tight spot on some target material, the incredible energy of the laser pulse rips the material apart atom by atom, creating a miniature plasma that looks like a small spark-plug spark. Because it was created by a laser, we call this a laser-induced plasma (LIP). The LIP is relatively easy to create and control, and it can be created on almost any material one can imagine, which makes it a very powerful and attractive analytic tool for rapidly and easily determining the composition of an unknown target. By firing the laser at a specimen containing bacteria, I can rapidly determine the atomic composition of the bacteria, and thus uniquely identify it. This ability to detect and identify bacterial pathogens in near real-time is important in many facets of human life, including clinical medicine and in hospitals, in the law-enforcement and first-responder community, in food and beverage hygiene, and in drinking/swimming water cleanliness and safety. As such, it has the potential to impact all Canadians in many aspects of their lives. The LIP is also a perfect laboratory environment to make exotic ions of unusual elements that can then be measured to determine their unique atomic properties. This information is vital for astronomers and astrophysicists who see these elements in the light coming from distant stars. When we make these types of measurements we call this "laboratory astrophysics," and these measurements will benefit scientists all over Canada and the world. The applications of LIPs in industry, manufacturing, environmental monitoring, and fundamental science (to name just a few fields) are numerous and are growing every day. By training highly-qualified personnel in Windsor, we are preparing Canadian scientists and researchers to play a lead role in the development of this exciting new scientific technique and to be able to design, build, and utilize the next generation of high-technology apparatus.