METHOD OF PRODUCING AND DETECTING IONS OF THORIUM-229 AND THORIUM-232 ISOTOPES WITH DIFFERENT CHARGE RATIO Russian patent published in 2015 - IPC H01J49/10 

FIELD: chemistry.

SUBSTANCE: method of producing and detecting ions of thorium-229 and thorium-232 isotopes with a different charge ratio includes evaporating and ionising thorium, filtering the ions according to energy and filtering the ions according to mass/charge ratio, capturing thorium ions with a selected charge state in a quadrupole ion trap with a linear configuration. Further, the method includes cooling the thorium ions with a selected charge state in the quadrupole ion trap with a linear configuration to thermal temperatures while releasing helium, exposing the cooled thorium ions to laser radiation for cooling and spectroscopic analysis, evaporating and ionising to the required charge state of thorium cooled in advance on a tungsten rod and containing ²²⁹Th and ²³²Th isotopes with an electron beam with energy of 0.6-1 keV, emitted from a hot cathode. The method then includes filtering ions according to energy in an energy range with width of not more than 4 eV, which corresponds to the maximum number of ions with the required charge state, slowing down the ions to energy not more than 5 eV and filtering the ions according to mass/charge ratio by quadrupole mass spectrometry.

EFFECT: increasing the efficiency of using a sample, reducing the required amount of sample and reducing the hazard of accumulation of the used radioactive materials, reducing the variation of the number of ions loaded into the trap.

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