System and process for dissolution of solids

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9782731-B2
Application number	US-201414292164-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	May 30, 2014
Priority date	May 30, 2014
Publication date	Oct 10, 2017
Grant date	Oct 10, 2017

Abstract

A system and process are disclosed for dissolution of solids and “difficult-to-dissolve” solids. A solid sample may be ablated in an ablation device to generate nanoscale particles. Nanoparticles may then swept into a coupled plasma device operating at atmospheric pressure where the solid nanoparticles are atomized. The plasma exhaust may be delivered directly into an aqueous fluid to form a solution containing the atomized and dissolved solids. The composition of the resulting solution reflects the composition of the original solid sample.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A pre-analytical sample preparation process using an inductively coupled plasma (ICP) for preparing hard-to-dissolve solids for analysis the process comprising the steps of:
ablating a portion of the solid in an ablation device into particles into a carrier gas;
passing the carrier gas and ablated particles through a plasma to atomize the ablated particles at a temperature selected at or above about 4000 Kelvin; and
capturing the atomized particles and the carrier gas in an aqueous solution to form a sample.

2. The process of claim 1 , wherein the carrier gas is selected from the group consisting of: argon (Ar), helium (He), nitrogen (N 2 ), oxygen (O 2 ), air, and combinations thereof.

3. The process of claim 1 , wherein the sample contains less than about 2% by weight of a concentrated dissolution agent therein.

4. The process of claim 1 , wherein capturing the atomized particles and the carrier gas in an aqueous solution to form a sample is performed by delivering the atomized particles and the carrier gas into the aqueous solution through a gas bubbler or frit.

5. A process for performing inductively coupled plasma mass spectroscopy (ICP-MS) analysis of solids comprising the steps of:
pretreating the solid by ablating at least a portion of the solid in an ablation device into particles into a carrier gas;
passing the carrier gas and ablated particles through a plasma to atomize the ablated particles at a temperature selected at or above about 4000 Kelvin to form plasma gas atoms;
capturing the atomized particles and the carrier gas in an aqueous solution to form a sample; and
analyzing the sample using an ICP-MS device to determine and quantify components in the original solid.

6. The method of claim 5 , wherein the solid is not treated with an acid, alkali or other chemicals.

7. The method of claim 5 , wherein the solid contains glass.

8. The method of claim 5 , wherein the solid contains boron carbide.

9. The method of claim 5 , wherein the solid is a ceramic.

10. The method of claim 5 , wherein the solid contains a corrosion-resistant metal containing Zr, or Nb, or Hf, or Ta.

11. A process for performing inductively coupled plasma mass spectroscopy (ICP-MS) analysis of solids, comprising the steps of:
pretreating the solid by ablating at least a portion of the solid in an ablation device into a carrier gas;
passing the carrier gas and ablated particles through the ICP plasma to atomize the ablated particles to form plasma gas atoms;
capturing the exhausted atomized particles and the carrier gas from the ICP in water to form a sampling solution; and
analyzing the sampling solution using an ICP-MS device to determine and quantify components in the original solid.

12. The process of claim 11 , wherein the step of capturing the exhausted atomized particles and the carrier gas from the ICP is performed by bubbling through a frit.

13. The process of claim 12 , wherein the exhaust is captured using a vacuum.

14. The process of claim 11 , wherein the solid is not treated with an acid, alkali or other chemicals.

Assignees

• Liezers Martin
• Farmer Iii Orville T
• Battelle Memorial Institute

Inventors

• Liezers Martin
• Farmer Iii Orville T

Classifications

• H05H1/34 Primary

  Details, e.g. electrodes, nozzles · CPC title

• B01F1/0038 Primary

  Operations & Transport · mapped topic

• B01F1/0005

  Operations & Transport · mapped topic

• H05H2240/10

  at atmospheric pressure · CPC title

• B01F21/02

  Methods · CPC title