Rare earth elements (REE)
Definition
The lanthanide series (La to Lu) plus yttrium and sometimes scandium. Their relative abundances in a rock or soil are set by igneous or sedimentary processes and are resistant to surface weathering, making REE patterns a stable provenance fingerprint.
Related terms
- Chondrite normalisation
- The practice of dividing each REE concentration by the concentration of that element in a chondritic meteorite (or another reference material such...
- ICP-MS
- Inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry: the laboratory reference method for trace element quantification in food matrices. Uses high-temperature argon plasma to atomise...
- ICP-OES
- Inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry: the plasma excites atoms which emit element-specific wavelengths of light on returning to ground state; suited...
- LA-ICP-MS
- Laser ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry; a technique that fires a laser pulse at a sample surface, vaporises a tiny amount,...
- Spectral interference
- In ICP-MS, an overlap between the mass of the target analyte and that of a polyatomic or isobaric ion from another element...
Explained in
- ICP-MS and ICP-OES: Trace-Element FingerprintingThe lanthanide series (La to Lu) plus yttrium and sometimes scandium. Their relative abundances in a rock or soil are set by igneous or sedimentary processes a...