Laser ablation in analytical chemistry—a review

Laser ablation is becoming a dominant technology for direct solid sampling in analytical chemistry. Laser ablation refers to the process in which an intense burst of energy delivered by a short laser pulse is used to sample (remove a portion of) a material. The advantages of laser ablation chemical analysis include direct characterization of solids, no chemical procedures for dissolution, reduced risk of contamination or sample loss, analysis of very small samples not separable for solution analysis, and determination of spatial distributions of elemental composition. This review describes recent research to understand and utilize laser ablation for direct solid sampling, with emphasis on sample introduction to an inductively coupled plasma (ICP). Current research related to contemporary experimental systems, calibration and optimization, and fractionation is discussed, with a summary of applications in several areas.