Laser Fraunhofer Method for the Correction of Physical Interference in an Atomic Absorption Nebulizer

Abstract

The Fraunhofer diffraction of laser radiation was applied to the correction of physical interference in a nebulizer used for atomic absorption spectrometry. A chamber with windows was mounted between the nebulizer system and the burner head. A He-Ne laser beam passing through the chamber was diffracted by droplets and constructed an image. The diffraction image received by a linear image sensor of 1024 elements was processed by a microcomputer to obtain the size distribution and the total volume of the droplets. The correction was made by dividing the absorbance by the total volume.