Effects of several experimental parameters on the relative sensitivity factors in spark-source mass spectrometric analysis of steel

Modification in the surface composition of sparked electrodes and its relation to relative sensitivity factors in spark source mass spectrometry

“…Again it can be seen that most elements are surface enriched with respect to iron, whereas Ni is depleted. No significant difference was observed between the composition of steel electrode surfaces sparked for 15 and 30 min, respectively, indicating that after 15 min of sparking a steady state is reached. No surface enrichment or depletion was observed in the unsparked metal.…”

“…On the other hand, many reports deal with the influence of experimental conditions on the value of an RSF. The factors were shown to be influenced by the shape of the sample electrodes (13), spark-gap width (14,15), spark voltage, repetition frequency, and accelerating voltage (16), temperature of the sample electrodes (17), etc. The above considerations lead to the conclusion that it is inadequate to express the RSF only as a ratio of some physical property of a measured element to that of an internal standard element and that the equation for calculating the RSF should contain a factor determined by the measurement conditions (17).…”