Foster & Freeman unveil new product at the AAFS in the USA

Foster & Freeman plan to reveal its latest offering for the examination of forensic evidence at the American Academy of Forensic Sciences’ convention, to be held in Dallas, Texas, this month.

LIBS, laser induced breakdown spectroscopy, is a relatively new technique for the analytical examination of materials which has been made possible by the advent of very high intensity pulsed lasers. These provide enough energy in a brief instant to atomise matter and raise its temperature by thousands of degrees. The excited matter then emits a characteristic visible spectrum as the various vaporized elements return to their normal room temperature state.

The spectrum can be used to identify the basic elements in the material under examination and provide a means of identifying or distinguishing between different samples by spectral comparison. The technique is fast, producing spectra in a matter of seconds and provides an alternative to conventional mass spectroscopy, a much more expensive analytical technique.

The company will be presenting a working prototype, a compact bench top instrument, which it plans to make commercially available later in the year.

An evaluation of the new instrument, with particular emphasis on its potential applications in forensic science, will be undertaken by Dr Jose Almirall and his team at the Florida International University, USA. Dr Almirall is a leading expert on the use of elemental analysis to characterize materials evidence and in the forensic examination of transfer evidence such as glass. Dr Almirall and his group have authored over 40 publications in the area of forensic chemistry applications.

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