Identification of nuclear materials using portable laser-induced plasma spectroscopy

Abstract

For nuclear security and safeguard, it is necessary to detect and identify nuclear materials. Laser-induced Plasma Spectroscopy (LIPS，also LIPS) has great potential to rapid identify the elemental composition for on-site nuclear inspection and forensic. To demonstrate the application of on-site identification of suspicious materials, a portable LIPS device was set up. The detection sensitivity of the device for uranium is about tens of ppm. Tests were carried out to identify suspicious materials, each sample was identified within seconds. The results show that the device has successfully identified nuclear materials from the samples with disturbances. It is demonstrated that the portable LIPS can identify target elements in nuclear material on site, providing a novel technology for nuclear security.