Tips and Tricks for Challenging ICP-MS Applications

Hello everyone and welcome to lead managers ask the expert webinar series. My name is Mary Beth vidhana, and I'll be moderating today's discussion tips and tricks for challenging ICP ms applications. We like our webinars to be very interactive, so we encourage you to submit your questions to us at any point during today's webinar.

Our experts will address these questions during the question and answer session following this presentation. To ask a question or leave a comment. Simply type your query into the q&a box located on the right hand side of your screen. We will try to address as many questions as possible during our time together. But if we happen to run out of time, I will forward any unanswered questions to our speakers and they can respond to you directly if possible. Additional resources for today's presentation are located on the right hand side of your screen in the handout section. I would like to remind you that this webinar recording will be available on demand shortly following this presentation.

So please watch for an email from lab manager on how to access this free video once it's available. I would also like to extend a special thank you to our sponsors ABI on intership scientific and glass expansion. Their support allows land manager to offer these webinars free of charge to our readers. So with that, I'd like to introduce our presenters for this webinar. Dr. Fadi Abu chakra is director of ICP ms portfolio with abbiano intership scientific. Joseph Brady is ICP MS application scientist also with Abby on intership scientific and Dr. Ryan and Brandon is president of glass expansion. Party. John Ryan, thanks for joining us today, buddy. Please get us started.

Good morning. Good afternoon. And good evening, everyone. Thank you for joining us.

It has been over 40 years since Professor somehow who was then a grad student published his paper on the coupling of an ICP as a powerful ionization source that is capable of generating representative high population of singly charged ions of the sample to a quadrupole mass spectrometer, which is a technique known for its selectivity, specificity, isotopic information capabilities, and low background. This publication announced the start of a new era in the world of trace element analysis, where ICBMs became the dominant technique in the field. And over those 40 years, we saw the performance improve in leaps and bounds.

First, on the detection power side of things, when we saw the detection limits, going from sub ppb to sub PPT levels, partially due to sensitivity improvement over those years of over three orders of magnitude.

Secondly, by addressing spectroscopic interferences, although ICP, it does a great job at generating singly charged positive ions of the elements. There are some combinatory ions that form and these ions can cause interference, especially when looking at low levels of the elements. Initially, we use correction equations to resolve these interferences. But by the late 90s, collision reaction cells became commercially available to eliminate these interferences.

Before going into details about the cells, I'd like to mention a third key improvement in ICPMS, which is the ability to handle complex matrices containing high dissolved solids, which Joe and Brian will be talking about. Collision reaction cells are ion guides seated in front of the quadrupole and filled with a gas that could be inert, like helium.

That's in the case of collision mode, or could be reactive gases such as oxygen, ammonia, methane, in the case of reaction mode. These ion guides are typically multiples, such as quadrupole exaple, octupole. And in collision mode, the larger cross section of the molecular ions become military ions that are interfering with our element.

Because of the larger cross sections, they will collide more with inert gas than the isobaric equivalent element Alliance. And because they're going to collide more, that means they will have less energy when exiting the ion guide. Therefore, if we apply the appropriate energy barrier between the ion guide and the quadrupole, we can efficiently overcome that interference by improving the detection powers and addressing the interference issues. ICBMs became the technique of choice for a plethora of applications such as food, environmental, pharmaceuticals, and semiconductors to sit to name a few.

However, as with any analytical technique, there are some general good practices and guidelines that the end user must follow. And sometimes these guidelines do vary between matrices. I will leave it to my colleague, Joe Brady to share with you his experience and provide some guidelines when it comes to the analysis of trace elements in complex matrices.

And as we do that, I'd like to do a quick survey to see how many of you are familiar with ICBMs. So can you please fill out a poll that we can shoot out? And let's see what kind of experience we have in the room?

Okay, great. Thanks very much fati. And I have launched that poll to the audience. So you should all see it in front of you. At this point, I'm going to invite Joe Brady to turn on his camera and microphone and begin his portion of the presentation. So Joe, thanks for joining us. Hi, thank you.

Yeah, thanks, buddy. So today, I'm gonna go over some of the recent applications that we've done on the selection, ICP mass spec, some of the challenges that we've had, and a few things that we've learned along the way.

These are the applications that we'll be covering. And they're listed, both in chronological order and in the order of complexity.

The first is hemp analysis, where we're looking at the Big Four heavy metals, so arsenic, cadmium, Mercury lead.

The second is soils analysis, we're running EPA method 3051.

And lastly, we're looking at blood analysis, where we're looking at a wide range of elements with a simple sample prep method.

So the challenge from him really comes from using hydrochloric acid in the digestion. The digestion itself is really straightforward. It's microwave digestion. And it's with most of these methods, the program is pre loaded, or pre loaded on most of these systems. So after the samples are weighed, and in the vessels and you've added the acids and spikes and add them all ready to go, you essentially just select hemp analysis and press Start the issue with high chloride from the HCl results in an increase in chlorine based interferences, some of which have shown in the table to the right.

Then most problematic of these is their math 75. Because it's overlapping with ours, at 75, and arsenic is monoisotopic. So therefore, we've got to compensate for Oregon chloride at 75 to get optimum results for arsenic. So here we see the effects of the collision cell. But first, I want to cover a couple of terms that I use throughout this presentation.

The detection limit is the smallest amount of an analyte that will produce a signal at the detector that can be statistically distinguished from noise. It's calculated as 3.3 times the standard deviation of the signal of a group of blanks typically 10. The ello que, or the limit of quantitation is the smallest amount of an analyte that can be reliably quantified by the method. And it's calculated as 10 times this standard deviation of the group of blanks.

What we're seeing in the chart is the results of running arsenic with and without the collision cell and comparing the reduction in interference or background versus the reduction in sensitivity.

In other words, the collision cell reduces the intensity of both the analyte in in or interference.

But it has a much greater effect on the interference. So the result of this is a tenfold improvement in the detection limit in the yellow queue of arsenic, you're using the collision cell. So, our next application was so as soils where we have the same issues that we had with hemp, but we also have residual chloride from any salt that's naturally in soil.

We also have the situation where some elements are present at present levels and other elements are there in ppm or lower levels.

So sodium, calcium, iron, and aluminum may be at one to 5%. So we've got to dilute the samples enough so that we won't saturate detector, but not so much that we lose the signal from our trace elements. And with soils, there's always going to be some amount of rare earth elements present at unpredictable levels. So if you're a laboratory running samples from all over the country, you're never really sure what those levels are going to be. So since internal standards are always obscure, rare earth elements, it really makes them unreliable when analyzing soils.

And then something else that can be tricky when choosing or looking at standard reference materials is what these certified values really mean or what they're based on. So, in for the soil analysis, I use a couple of nice soils. And there certified values are based on a complete dissolution of the soil sample. So in other words, the, all the material in the in the soil is completely dissolved. So anything that's mineralized or any part of the sand component of soil is being accounted for in those certified values.

And these kinds of complete digestion really require using HF, and that, you know, are our instruments out of the box. And most other instruments out of the box aren't set up to handle HF. And but the main point is, is that EPA methods like 3051, are technically an extraction. Because in agriculture, what's really important is the amount of free or available elements. And what this means in practical terms is that the certified values are not necessarily going to be the targets.

And we'll see more about that in a slide that's coming up. And then the last point here is that soils or soil digests are also going to have high levels of total dissolved solids, which can cause problems at the nebulizer, particularly where you can get some salting at the tip that can potentially clog the nebulizer or change the efficiency of the nebulizer and just cause problems. And an Oregon humidifier really helps to avoid that.

So here, I've shown the sample introduction system that we use on the simulation. And as you probably guessed, we use glass expansion products for our center production. And we made that decision based on quite a bit of internal testing. So it's a decision that we've put some thought into but um,

What I've what I've really highlighted here is the a Lego Allegra Aragon humidifier. It's filled up with tabs with some lab water. And there's a little piece of semi permeable tubing inside that effectively humidifies the nebulizer gas stream. And that humidification helps prevent any buildup on the nebulizer tip.

And then the nice thing about it and why zoomed in on the top is that if you're not using it, or if you don't need it, you can switch it over to bypass. So this isn't something that you'll have to hook up when you need it and then dismantle it when you don't, you can just turn it over to bypass.

So back to my previous point about the nest soils, there is an addendum at the back that describes the results from a group of outside laboratories running EPA methods like 3051, which is one I use. And as you can see, there's a range of result values with some recovery figures.

Perhaps the most telling figure is the recovery where for some elements like aluminum, these laboratories are typically getting a 30% recovery. Another way of looking at looking at it is that only 30% of the aluminum in the soil sample is available or isn't bound in a mineral or some structure that would take a total dissolution with hydrofluoric acid to break.

So here, I grouped my the elements from analyzing 2706 into three different levels. So they grouped them into high, mid and low levels. And then I use bars to define the high and low end stuff range that we saw in that previous sheet. And then I plotted the certified value, the median recovery value and our analytical results together. And what you can see for some elements is that the certified value and the recovery mean are pretty far apart.

But what's important in our case is that our analytical result, the Golden Triangle is right within the range for nearly all of these elements. And in a lot of cases, the the recovery of median is obscured by the the triangle that represents our result. So our next application challenge is blood. And running blood had really all of the complications from the previous applications and then some.

But what makes this one unique is that it uses a diluent that is 2% methanol. So that means that we have a volatile source of carbon, which results in an increase in some carbon based interferences. In the table, I've listed some of the carbon based interferences and the affected analytes and then highlight the interferences that affect chromium in particular. And as you can see, both chromium 52 and 53 have significant overlaps significant interferences. So, in this case, I wanted to see whether running chromium 53 in Standard Mode would be better or using the collision cell to run chromium 52. And those are the results that have summarized in the table below.

And what you can see is that we were able to reduce the background of 52 enough to get superior results at that mass compared to 53. Our BC or the background equivalent concentration is lower by an order of magnitude. And we have a six fold reduction in the detection limit and ello Q at 52 Compared to 53. So, the collision cell really helped in this instance.

So the one thing that isn't challenging in blood analysis is sample prep. So it's basically a dilute and shoot type method. So we have a sample diluent. That is, it's being used both to prepare and dilute the samples. So the diluent is a fairly complex mixture, but it's made from nitric acid as you would expect, that keeps all of the elements stable and in solution. But it's being used at a low level, only half a percent, so that we don't end up precipitating any proteins or cell debris.

Then there's also Triton x 100, which is particularly good at solvating proteins and cell membranes. But it's also really good because it's a wetting agent. So it helps with the, the, essentially the liquid dynamics and draining in the spray chamber.

And, as I said previously, there's 2% methanol. And it really helps both improve the efficiency of nebulization. And it also helps improve vitamins. And there's also gold in the diluent. Because since Mercury is one of our analytes, that gold helps stabilize the mercury, and really helps with wash out. And then we also have our internal standards in the diluent. Which makes it really convenient because we use that diluent for the standards and samples and really all of the sample prep. So it just automatically adds our internal standards.

So as I said, since we're running methanol, and we've got this big source of volatile carbon, one of the options is running the spray chamber at a lower temperature, since that should really reduce the amount of methanol that ends up in the plasma, and should really reduce some of the associated carbon based interferences. So what I've shown here are the results of running a group of acid diluent blanks, focusing on a couple of elements that are particularly affected by carbon. There's magnesium at 24, which is affected by the carbon dimer. And as we've seen previously chromium in the chart, I'm comparing the BC the DL and the LQ of magnesium and chromium at two degrees C. And at room temperature roughly 23.

The lower temperature reduce the background of magnesium by half. But it had more of a modest effect on the Chromium background, which isn't entirely unexpected. Given that there's so many other interferences, they're 52. But there's better than a 50% reduction in the deal and the LOL Q for both elements. But the something that certainly helped is the improved stability that we saw at two c, which is why include included the percent RST values there for both.

So that certainly helps when we have more stable signal.So with that, I wanted to say thank you for paying attention. And I also have a poll question. And that is, are you planning to purchase an ICP mass spec or any kind of related technology? And then there's a few timeframes there.

If the answer depending on what your answer is. So thank you. Okay, great. Thanks very much, Joe. And again, I've launched that poll to the audience. So we invite you to answer that poll. And at this point, I'd like to invite Ryan and Brennan to begin his presentation. So Ryan, thanks for joining us today.

Thank you, Fati and Joe and a special thanks to our host lab manager for organizing this webinar. My name is Ryan Brennan, president of glass expansion. Today I will be presenting in greater detail the glass expansion products that were highlighted in Joe's application work, which are well suited for improving the performance of your ICP ms with challenging sample matrices.

Firstly, please allow me to briefly introduce our company. Glass expansion is a world leader in the research design and manufacturing of ICP sample introduction components. With over four decades of experience class expansion has earned a reputation for quality, precision engineering and reliability. Glass expansions product portfolio includes torches, RF coils, nebulizers, spray chambers, peristaltic, Pump Tubing, productivity accessories and ICP ms interface Collins. Glass expansion has pioneered important innovations in the ICP sample introduction, including the industry standard cyclonic spray chamber, the micro mist and sea spray nebulizers, our isomethyl X our temperature controlled spray chamber, our patented D torch, demountable torch, with ceramic outer tube, and essential quality control tools such as the true flow sample monitor, Leu, oh, nebulizer cleaning tool, and Guardian inline sample filter.

And many of these designs are supplied as standard equipment on several ICPs because of their reproducibility, long lifetime and dependability. reproducibility, quality and dependability provide ICP laboratories with a significant long term cost savings. Glass expansions products are designed to last longer and provide optimum performance and when a replacement is needed, there is no time wasted re optimizing due to glass expansions unique and proprietary manufacturing methods, which enables the production of components with high mechanical accuracy and precision. Our commitment to research and product development, which includes owning ICP OES and ICP ms instruments from several manufacturers enables us to produce innovative design solutions and conduct real world testing that leads to the best possible performance, consistency and reliability for your laboratory. And with our warranty policy, you have our guarantee.

Today's topic is tips and tricks for challenging ICP ms applications. Some of the challenges associated with high matric samples include interrupted runs, signal drift, clogged nebulizers, shorten consumables life and greater interferences. And as a result of lab experiences, more frequent maintenance intervals and higher operational costs.

The standard sample introduction system of your ICP ms determines many factors, including detection limits precision, different matrix tolerances, and of course cost. Your ICP ms performance can be significantly improved by careful choice of your sample introduction system, taking into account the type of samples that will be analyzed. Today I will highlight class expansions micromass nebulizer, Allegra argon humidifier Twister cyclonic spray chamber and ISO Mist X our temperature controlled spirit chamber. I will detail the glass expansion design details and how each of these products can improve the performance of your ICP ms, which was also highlighted in joules application work using the Adomian intercom scientific solution ICP ms

one of the most important sample introduction decisions is choosing the most suitable nebulizer glass expansion is trademarked micromass nebulizer is our most popular nebulizer for ICP ms applications, and the standard nebulizer configuration for many ICP ms manufacturers, including the Atomium inter cam scientific solution ICPMS. The micromass provides excellent transport efficiency and precision at low sample flow rates. In addition to providing great versatility by being able to handle up to 15% total dissolved solids. The excellent transport efficiency is achieved by producing a very fine aerosol with a narrow droplet size distribution. In addition to achieving excellent sensitivity the combination of the low uptake rate and small droplet size also helps to create a more robust plasma condition, which in turn results in improved stability and performance with higher matric samples.

This makes the micromass an excellent choice for high TDS Samples Blood ncrm to name a few examplesnow let's examine the design details of glass expansions micromass nebulizer, most notable as glass expansions, unique ventricle and sample capillary, which is standard on all of our class concentric nebulizers. A non glass expansion design uses a thin and fragile hand drawn class Sample capillary. With hand drawn sample capillaries that internal diameter can vary, which prevents it a laminar nebulizer gas flow and create points where particulates may lodge the glass expansion Vitra cone sample capillary is entirely different.

This machine from a thick walled glass capillary, providing a highly reproducible geometry and consistent internal diameter from sample inlet to tip in combination with our trademark uni fit sample connector, which easily slides over the sample arm of the nebulizer creates an excellent seal and zero dead volume sample connection. Glass expansion introduced the direct connection gasline and 2016. Providing an upgrade to our use series nebulizer product line with an inert metal free ICP specific gas line. The reliable ratchet click and seal fitting to the nebulizer gas arm insurance a leak free gas connection by clicking or ratcheting when a proper seal has been achieved and preventing over tightening at the other end of the DC gas line is an ICP specific quick connect to the argon gas supply. This improved gas connection helps to maintain optimal back pressure for consistent day to day nebulizer performance.

For optimum performance with high total dissolved solids and high matric samples, such as soils, you can humidify the nebulizer gas before it comes in contact with the sample, decreasing the likelihood of salt deposits forming at the nebulizer and injector tip. Adding an argon humidifier will reduce maintenance intervals and improve long term signal stability by preventing salt buildup at the nebulizer and injector, which in turn results in signal drift.

Glass expansion design the lager argon humidifier shown here to provide an efficient yet simple to use accessory for both ICP OES and ICP ms applications for easy installation on any instrument. And with any nebulizer. Each elogger kit is packaged with customized Direct Connect gas connectors, the same use with our direct connect nebulizers the logger is compact roughly the size of a soda can. As you saw on the photo with the solution ICPMS there is no heating or electrical power required. It is completely metal free and uses a non pressurized water reservoir.

Here's data collected using a nebulizer not recommended for high total dissolved solids work under a stress test of continuously aspirating 25% Sodium chloride with no rinsing. With no humidification. The nebulizer is completely clogged in a few minutes. In comparison to with the humidifier on the nebulizer can aspirate continuously for over 30 minutes. Although analyzing solutions with such high levels of dissolved solids is generally not recommended. This is a great example of how the library can improve the nebulizer performance with high matric samples.

Now that we have covered the nebulizer choice for your ICPMS let's move on to spray chamber selection. Glass expansion offers a wide variety of spray chambers, each of which provides optimum results for all kinds of sample types. On our website www.gicp.com We have helpful selection guides in addition to a team of experts ready to assist you. As I mentioned previously, today we'll be highlighting class expansions twistor and ICMS XR cyclonic spray chamber options.

Class expansions to most popular trademarks iconic spray chamber designs are the twister and Tracy. The twist or cyclonic spray chamber features a central transfer tube often referred to as baffled or a double pass iconic.

This feature provides a smaller particle size and narrower distribution compared to a single pass like Clonic while the Tracy provides a greater transport efficiency leading to greater sensitivity. However, greater sensitivity is not always the best solution, smaller droplet sizes, reduce matrix effects and improve short term precision.

Making the twister the most suitable choice for higher matric samples such as soils, Bloods, and serums.

The reduced sample load helps to improve the performance of your ICPMS increase the life of your sample introduction system and also decrease the frequency of maintenance intervals.

Just as we did with the micromass nebulizer, let's examine the design details of glass expansions Twister cyclonic spray chamber.

As mentioned previously, the twister has a baffle or central knockout to which is cut at an angle and carefully positioned to maximize transport of the aerosol but also minimize the transport of large droplets. Note the walls of the spray chamber have a vertical region. This is important for proper aerosol generation and affects transport efficiency to the plasma.

An indented groove is built into the top of the spray chamber and serves as a barrier preventing solution from being swept into the torch. The position and depth of this group is critical.

All pumped cyclonic spray chambers include a uni FET sample connector and capillary for smooth and efficient draining.

And lastly, and most importantly, the helix constant torque fitting is carefully designed to fix the depth of penetration and torque applied to the nebulizer seal. So the aerosol produced is optimal. Do not be fooled by other manufacturers who attempted to replicate the helix design.

The Helix CT interface features a locking screw and seal that uses a constant torque ratchet mechanism to provide a zero dead volume gas tight seal between the nebulizer and spray chamber for consistent performance.

The analytical benefits of the helix CT interface include consistent performance, as ICP OES and ICP mass sensitivity is affected by both nebulizer depth within the spray chamber and torque applied to the nebulizer seal. The combination of torque control and the positive stop on the helix locking screw, which fixes the penetration depth allows the analyst to achieve the same nebulizer performance every day. Superior wash out the helix CT interface is also the only true zero dead volume spray chamber interface available. providing superior washout, especially for elements that are prone to carryover.

It's a Nurten O ring free the helix CT is chemically inert seal immune to strong acids and organic solvents eliminating all the drawbacks of an O ring seal. This also improves user safety. These design innovations have provided all glass expansion cyclonic spray chamber designs with sensitivity games reduce washout times and reduce matrix effects not possible with our competitors.

Thus far we have discussed a spray chamber that operates at room temperature. One consideration is that as the room temperature changes, so does that of the spray chamber and that affects the transport efficiency and hence the sensitivity resulting in analyte drift. Another concern is that with specific sample matrices, particularly those that are volatile, excessively low the plasma resulting in instability and in worst case, extinguish the plasma. For ICPMS applications excessive oxide formation can result at room temperature leading to isobaric interferences which must be dealt with. In summary, a room temperature spray chamber affords little control over analyte transport to the plasma.

Glass expansions ICMS XR is a programmable temperature controlled spray chamber that incorporates our proven Twister cyclonic spray chamber design that is then encapsulated in a conductive resin to enhance temperature control.

The ICMS is programmable from minus 25 to 80 degrees Celsius in one degree temperature increments. It maintains a temperature to within point one degrees Celsius is a compact design. It is 100% self contained in incorporates Bluetooth technology for wireless control. USB control is also available. It's compatible with all ICP OES and ICP ms models. The time taken to pass below zero degrees Celsius from room temperature is less than 15 minutes.

Benefits include the analysis of volatile organic samples enhance sensitivity for limited volume samples, reduced isobaric oxide interferences, improving background and providing a record of temperature control

And as we mentioned before temperature control eliminates the chance of analyte drift.

In summary, for those laboratories that require the utmost performance in the sample introduction system class expansion will have the optimal option for any sample matrix. Today we discussed options for challenging samples in the ICPMS laboratory. The micromass DC nebulizer provides excellent transport efficiency at low uptake rates for improved sensitivity and robust plasma conditions for a variety of sample types.

The use of the Allegra Aragon humidifier provides enhance long term stability for high matric samples to Twister with helix CT interface improves day to day reliability with an enhanced wash out capability.

The ICMS XR provides the additional benefit of temperature control for superior stability and the ability to set the temperature for optimum conditions. And although not detailed here today, proper maintenance of your sample introduction system will guarantee optimum performance, longer lifetime and significant cost savings. For tips on maintenance, please visit the product care section on glass expansions website www.gicp.com. We have guides and tools to help you maintain your sample introduction system.

Thank you all for your time today. And to add me on intercom scientific for their partnership and invitation to speak with you all today. And to our hosts lab manager for organizing this webinar. If you have any questions or interested in a quote, you can contact one of our three offices directly. We also have a global distribution network that can be found on the glass expansion website. Be sure to subscribe to our mailing list for regular updates on our sample introduction systems. Thank you again, and we look forward to working with you.

All right, thanks, Ryan, for a great presentation. And again, thank you to fati and Joe as well as our speakers, I'm going to invite you to please turn on your mics and your cameras if you'd like and join us for the q&a, you can unmute your microphones. And our speakers have also generously provided their contact info, which you should see on the screen in front of you now. So if you'd like to get in touch with them after the webinar, please feel free. So at this time, we are going to move into our question and answer session with the audience. Again, for those of you who may have joined us late, you can send in your questions by typing them into the q&a box located on the right hand side of your screen. Even if you don't have a question, we invite you to leave a comment, let us know how you enjoyed this presentation. And if you would like glass expansion, or I'd be on intership scientific to reach out to you please leave a comment as well. So again, thanks to all of you for a great presentation. Let's go to the first question here. This one says for the hemp analysis, why not just avoid using hydrochloric acid?

Well, yeah, it ultimately depends on which elements you're looking at.

And for that one in particular, since Mercury was one of the elements, we really need the hydrochloric acid in there to be able to extract and stabilize the mercury that's in the sample. But if it was a different elements sweet, and it didn't have elements that really required

some HCl, then yeah, we could eliminate it.

Alright, great. Thanks, Joe. Let's go move on to our next question. You might just scroll down a bit to see on the list. Are there standard published methods for whole blood elemental analysis?

That is an excellent question. And as far as I can tell,

I haven't been able to find any. So I wouldn't consider this to be an authoritative answer. But obviously, that was one of the first things that I was looking for. And the only thing that I did come across is a ,there's a NIOSH method that is really quite ancient. So it's from 1994.

That's for digesting blood and tissue for elements by ICP emission. But, but to answer your question about any standard published methods that are currently I don't believe there are and at least if there are I haven't been able to find them.

Okay, great. Thanks.I'll take the question that's below that one. This one says in what cases would you recommend a ceramic outer tube and a D torch.

So, the D torch is a is a great accessory for variety of sample matrices. ceramic outer to become beneficial when you are seeing a rapid deep rich vacation of your standard quartz torch or premature fracture of the torch. So the D torch with ceramic outer tube is used for samples that have a volatile organic matrix, high salt content.

We've also seen benefits of using the ceramic outer tube to enhance the sensitivity of some elements because it creates a hotter plasma. So, there are a variety of applications as well as several benefits to using a D torch with a ceramic outer tube. If you would like to ask some more specific questions about your particular laboratory, I'd be happy to take those offline. If you just want to reach out to me directly we can go into more details.

Okay, great. Thanks, Ryan. Here's another question and this one says what is the best nebulizer for analysis of soil samples by Agent 7900. Ah, as I mentioned earlier on in the presentation, the micro mist is a is a great all around nebulizer for ICPMS applications. So, typically soils are prone to having a higher dissolved solid content. They're also due to the nature of the preparation and what's in there there. They're also prone to precipitate it happening. So in those cases, although the micro mist is able to handle those sample types, if you really want to get the the best performance with soil samples as as Joe mentioned it there's a real benefit to adding on an argon humidifier. In the end it's it's a very simple accessory, it's it's no brainer doesn't negatively affect the performance of your instrument. And as Joe's showed that it provides a it a significant improvement in your long long term stability, just avoiding the salting on the nebulizer and even the injector as well.

Okay, great. Thanks very much. We have a couple other questions here. This one says is there any disadvantage or negative effects when humidifying the nebulizer gas, specifically sensitivity or precision?

So yeah, that sort of goes into the the questions that I just answered. What's nice about an argon humidifier is it even if you don't necessarily per se need it, because your percent total dissolved solids is relatively low, you can actually use an argon humidifier to just in general reduce the maintenance frequency on your sample introduction system, specifically the nebulizer. So it's basically helping to keep your sample introduction system run clean. And then again, as as Joe's already highlighted with the work on the solution ICPMS when you're dealing with more challenging sample matrix like soils, which have a higher dissolved solid content, that's where you get the benefits of improving your long term stability by preventing the salty method, nebulizer and injector tip.

Okay, great. Thank you. We have time for one more question. I think this one says can you turn the Allegro humidifier off?

Yes, so as Joe highlighted in his presentation, you the Allegra argon humidifier has a has a bypass switch. So without uninstalling or removing the leg or Aragon humidifier, you can simply turn humidification on and off throughout an analysis without having to disconnect anything.

Okay, wonderful. Thanks so much. So that does bring us to the end of this webinar. And again, I just like to remind you that this webinar will be available on demand shortly following this presentation. So please watch your email for a message

From lab manager once this video is available on behalf of lab manager, I'd like to thank Dr. Fadi Abu chakra, Joe Brady and Dr. Ryan Brennan for all the hard work they put into this presentation. And I would like to thank all of you for taking time out of your busy schedules to join us today. Once again, thank you to our sponsors at beyond intership scientific and glass expansion. Their support allows us to offer these webinars free of charge to our readers. For more information on all of our upcoming on demand webinars or learn more about the latest tools and technologies for the laboratory, please visit our website at lab manager.com. We hope you can join us again thank you and have a great day