The ANSTO – University of Wollongong in-situ 14C extraction laboratory
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Date
2019-01-01
Journal Title
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Publisher
Elsevier
Abstract
We present our first 14C in-situ results for calibration and system blanks from the recently completed Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) – University of Wollongong (UOW) in-situ 14C extraction system. System performance parameters and quality is evidenced by low 14C blanks and good reproducibility for multiple targets from different reference materials. The 14C extraction scheme exploits the high temperature phase transformation of quartz to cristobalite in order to quantitatively extract the carbon as CO2. The in-situ 14C extraction system comprises three independently operated and modular units that are used for initial in-vacuo removal of meteoric 14C, followed by offline high-temperature heating of quartz to release trapped cosmogenic in-situ 14C, and finally CO2 gas purification and mass measurement. The design allows for rapid sample throughput of about 6 samples per week with samples masses ranging between 0.5 and 4 g of clean quartz. Other features include single-pass catalytic oxidation using mixed copper (I,II) oxide as catalyst, use of UHV-compatible components and of vacuum annealed copper tubing. We present results for sets of purified quartz samples prepared from CRONUS-A, CRONUS-R and CRONUS-N inter-comparison materials, with final averages consistent with published values. Following extraction and cleaning, CO2 gas aliquots for some of the samples were analysed using the ETH Zürich CO2 gas ion source at the ETH MICADAS AMS facility in addition to CO2 being graphitised using the ANSTO laser-heated graphitisation micro-furnace and then analysed on ANSTO’s ANTARES AMS facility. System blanks using either CO2 or graphite ion-sources at both facilities are on the order of ∼1 × 104 atoms. © 2018 Elsevier B.V.
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Keywords
In-situ processing, Carbon 14, Isotopes, ANSTO, Calibration, Targets
Citation
Fülöp, R.-H., Fink, D., Yang, B., Codilean, A. T., Smith, A., Wacker, L., Levchenko, V., & Dunai, T. J. (2019). The ANSTO – University of Wollongong in-situ 14C extraction laboratory. Paper presented at 14th triennial International Conference on Accelerator Mass Spectrometry (AMS), Ottawa, Canada, August 14-18, 2017. In Kieser, W., Clark, I., Zhao, X., Crann, C., Gosse, J., Rehn, L. (eds) Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research Section B: Beam Interactions with Materials and Atoms, 438, 207-213. doi:10.1016/j.nimb.2018.04.018