A Low-Cost Plasma Spectroscopy Instrument Design

While any instrumental elemental analysis is often thought of as an expensive and complicated technique requiring large investments, we present a design of a high-temperature plasma spectrometer, a Spark Discharge Optical Emission Spectroscopy (SD-OES) instrument, built with inexpensive, easy-to-find components, aimed at applications in education, industry and research. Opportunities that aim to make SD-OES accessible to a broad community as a high-quality alternative to the more costly instruments are highlighted. We describe and demonstrate the new, low-cost, prototype instrument for elemental analysis of solid and liquid materials. Application of the instrument to elemental analysis of various samples is described. The presented instrument design shows that high-precision SD-OES instrumentation can be accomplished using very modest and widely approachable components making the design described in this article affordable for various low-income educational institutions or small industrial entities. The high availability of free characteristic emission spectral lines databases, built for other similar analytical methods such as Laser Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS), that can be used by this instrument, makes this design even more available for the general community.