“…While matrix-matched calibration-curves can be used for quantitative analysis of solids (Hunter and Piper, 2006;Eppler et al, 1996), various groups have successfully implemented CF-LIBS to quantify the composition of metal alloys (Tognoni et al, 2007(Tognoni et al, , 2010Ciucci et al, 1999;Herrera et al, 2009a) and metal oxides (Praher et al, 2010) in a gaseous environment, achieving relative accuracies of 5 to 15% for major elements. With regard to interpretation of natural sediments and rocks, most studies report degradation in accuracy due to the complexity of the signals obtained (Tognoni et al, 2010;Herrera et al, 2009b;Colao et al, 2004;De Giacomo et al, 2007). Moreover, conventional CF methods require all the major elements to be identified in the spectra, which is not possible for the limited range and resolution of the spectrometer used in ChemiCam.…”