Measurement system for high-sensitivity LIBS analysis using ICCD camera in LabVIEW environment

A measurement system based on ultrafast (up to 10 ns time resolution) intensified CCD detector Nanogate-2V (Nanoscan, Russia) was developed for high-sensitivity analysis by Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectrometry (LIBS). LabVIEW environment provided a high level of compatibility with variety of electronic instruments and an easy development of user interface, while Visual Studio environment was used for creation of LabVIEW compatible dll library with the use of Nanogate-2V SDK. The program for camera management and laser-induced plasma spectra registration was created with the use of Call Library Node in LabVIEW. An algorithm of integration of the second device ADC PCI-9812 (ADLINK) to the measurement system was proposed and successfully implemented. This allowed simultaneous registration of emission and acoustic signals under laser ablation. The measured resolving power of spectrometer-ICCD system was equal to 12000 at 632 nm. An electron density of laser plasma was estimated with the use of H-alpha Balmer line. Steel spectra obtained at different delays were used for selection of the optimal conditions for manganese analytical signal registration. The feature of accumulation of spectra from several laser pulses was shown. The accumulation allowed reliable observation of silver signal at 328.07 nm in the LIBS spectra of soil (C-Ag = 4.5 ppm). Finally, the correlation between acoustic and emission signals of plasma was found. Thus, technical possibilities of the developed LIBS system were demonstrated both for plasma diagnostics and analytical measurements.