An Improved Pneumatic Concentric Nebulizer for Atomic Absorption. II. Aerosol Characterization

Abstract

The aerosol droplets generated by a new pneumatic concentric nebulizer for flame spectrochemical applications are characterized. Droplet number density and size distributions were measured using low angle forward scattering of laser light and compared to aerosol density and size distributions for a conventional nebulizer. The effects of impact bead position, spray chamber droplet conditioning, burner head temperature, nebulizer driving pressure, and uptake rate on droplet size and number density, and atomic absorption response are presented. The observed improvement in response is a result of increased nebulizer efficiency in converting solution to usable aerosol.