Nuclear microprobe - synchrotron synergy: Towards integrated quantitative real-time elemental imaging using PIXE and SXRF

The Dynamic Analysis (DA) method, for the projection of quantitative elemental images using Proton Induced X-ray Emission (PIXE), has been extended for use with energy-dispersive Synchrotron X-ray Fluorescence (SXRF) data collected with the X-ray microprobe by making use of similarities and synergy with nuclear microscopy. The broad element sensitivity of PIXE is complemented by the selective nature of SXRF, where the beam energy can be tuned to optimize the sensitivity in a portion of the periodic table. PIXE combined with Proton Induced γ-ray Emission (PIGE) in this study provided images of geological samples of 25 elements, including characteristic X-rays up to the energy of the Nd K lines (37 keV). Maximum sensitivity was achieved for elements around Z ∼ 33 with detection limits of ∼250 ppb (in 5 h). SXRF using a 16.1 keV photon microbeam provided images of 16 elements, with optimum sensitivity around Z ∼ 35 with detection limits of ∼70 ppb (in 11 h), an improvement of ∼2.4 times when corrected for acquisition time.