STRAS: a new high time resolution aerosol sampler for PIXE analysis.

The joint use of hourly resolution sampling and analyses with accelerated ion beams such as Particle Induced X-ray Emission (PIXE) technique has allowed the measurement of hourly temporal patterns of particulate matter (PM) composition at many sites in different parts of the world. The demand within the scientific community for this type of analysis has been continuously increasing in recent years, but hourly resolution samplers suitable for PIXE analysis are now discontinued and/or suffer from some technical limitations. In this framework, a new hourly sampler, STRAS (Size and Time Resolved Aerosol Sampler), was developed for the collection of PM10, PM2.5 or PM1. It allows automatic sequential sampling of up to 168 hourly samples (1 week), it is mechanically robust, compact, and easily transportable. To increase PIXE sensitivity, each sample is concentrated on a small surface area on a polycarbonate membrane. The comparison between the elemental concentrations retrieved by STRAS samples and samples collected using a standard sequential sampler operated in parallel shows a very good agreement; indeed, if both the samplers use the same kind of membrane, the concentrations of all detected elements are in agreement within 10 %. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]