A new approach to LA-ICP-MS mapping and application in geology

作者:Wang FangYue*; Ge Gan; Ning SiYuan; Nie LiQing; Zhong GuoXiong; White, Noel C.
来源:Acta Petrologica Sinica, 2017, 33(11): 3422-3436.

摘要

In recent years, laser ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS) mapping is a new key analytical application to obtain chemical compositions in analyzed sample. LA-ICP-MS mapping has great advantages, e.g., easy sample preparing, low cost of equipment, fast, low detection limit, multi elemental analysis, comparing to other modern mapping techniques. Here we present a new LA-ICP-MS mapping method based on the PhotonMachines laser ablation system with Agilent ICP-MS-system. This mapping method is based on two. volume cell laser system and Matlab coding data reduction software named LaIcpMsSoftware (LIMS). This new method can generate multi-elements (more than 30) pictures of 3 mm x 3 mm mineral in less than 2 hours. Compared with other mapping software, LIMS has many advantages, e.g., easy to operation, variety data display mode and cutting section display, element ratio mapping, to facilitate data analysis and interpretation for geologist. We demonstrate mapping results of magmatic plagioclase, hydrothermal scheelite and skarn garnet and constrain the origin of such minerals in terms of mapping results. Our datasets reveal that LA-ICP-MS mapping can reveal geochemical details that cannot be appreciated with single spot analysis, and it is easier to get elements correlations to better understand the geochemical process in mineral. .