Recent trends and the future of laser-induced plasma spectroscopy

At the Xth Colloquium Spectroscopicum Internationale, held at the University of Maryland in June, 1962, Fred Brech described his initial encouraging spectrochemical measurements using a ruby 'maser'-induced plasma. The idea of using a laser-induced 'spark' as a spectrochemical plasma source is extremely attractive and the potential advantages are now very well known: no sample preparation is needed; a sample of any phase may be examined, electrically conducting or not; remote measurements are possible; spatial information can be obtained; and rapid, simultaneous multi-element analysis is possible. For the past 35 years, laser-induced plasma spectroscopy has been widely studied during three obvious periods of growing and declining interest. The last five years have seen a renewed level of activity in the field, largely the result of ever improving detection technologies and increasingly reliable laser sources. It now appears likely that laser-induced plasma spectroscopy will find useful applications in elemental process monitoring and in portable semi-quantitative elemental analyzers. The fundamental matrix sensitivity of the technique may limit its use as a general-purpose analytical tool, This review examines selected literature of 1997. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.