Investigation of Potential of Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy for Detection of Spatial Deposition and microCT for Volume Deposition of Pt in Minerals/Ores
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| Year of publication | 2013 |
| Type | Conference abstract |
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| Description | The platinum group metals (PGMs) i.e. platinum, palladium, rhodium, iridium, osmium and ruthenium represent the key materials for automotive exhaust gas treatment. Since currently exist no adequate alternatives, the importance of these metals for automotive industry is steadily rising. In order to localize new ore deposits it is important to develop suitable methods capable to detect critical metals in real time, even in extremely harsh climatic conditions of some ore deposit sites. In this paper we demonstrate that laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) can be applied as a suitable tool for elemental analysis, especially for 2-dimensional elemental mapping of minerals. In order to obtain the information about metals distribution in the sample volume, the microCT station has been utilized. We focused on sperrylite detection, which is a simple platinum arsenide with the chemical formula PtAs2 obtained from unique Talnakh deposit (Siberia, Russia). In our measurements it was demonstrated that LIBS is a method perfectly suitable for mineral analysis with the spatial resolution of at least 100 microns, with no need of a sample preparation and with the possibility to be performed for the distance of 6.2 m. A chemical map of the sample surface was prepared and compared with a chemical map made by reference technique – Tescan Integrated Mineral analyser (TIMA). Tomograms of each sample were prepared with the resolution of 20 microns. On the basis of the data obtained, it is then possible to reproduce spatially resolved chemical composition of ore samples. |
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