Thermal Desorption
Definition
The process of heating a swab or trap to release adsorbed analyte vapour for introduction into an IMS or GC instrument. Temperature must be controlled to prevent analyte decomposition (TATP decomposes at standard GC injector temperatures; PETN partially decomposes above 220 degrees Celsius).
Related terms
- CFSL Hyderabad Explosives Wing
- The explosives examination section of India's Central Forensic Science Laboratory in Hyderabad, the designated court-certifying facility for explosives analysis in major Indian...
- Control Swab (Background)
- A swab collected from an uncontaminated surface outside the outer cordon of a blast scene, processed identically to scene swabs, to establish...
- GC-ECD
- Gas chromatography with electron capture detection. Achieves 1-10 picogram detection limits for nitroaromatic (TNT, DNT) and nitramine (RDX, HMX, PETN) explosives. Cannot...
- Ion Mobility Spectrometry (IMS)
- A field-deployable analytical technique that separates ions by their mobility in an electric field at atmospheric pressure. Used for trace explosive detection...
- Multiple Reaction Monitoring (MRM)
- An LC-MS/MS acquisition mode in which the first quadrupole (Q1) selects a precursor ion at a specific m/z, the second (Q2) fragments...
- NIST SRM 8806
- A National Institute of Standards and Technology Standard Reference Material for explosive residue analysis, providing certified reference solutions of TNT, RDX, PETN,...
- Seat of Explosion
- The physical location at the centre of an explosion, identified by maximum crater depth, convergence of fragment-throw vectors, and highest damage density....
- SEM-EDX
- Scanning electron microscopy with energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy. The electron beam excites characteristic X-rays from each element present in the target grain, giving...
- Suppressed Conductivity IC
- An ion chromatography detection method in which a membrane suppressor chemically neutralises the background eluent conductivity, leaving only the analyte ions as...
Explained in
- Post-Blast Residue Sampling and the IMS, GC-ECD, LC-MS/MS WorkflowThe process of heating a swab or trap to release adsorbed analyte vapour for introduction into an IMS or GC instrument. Temperature must be controlled to preve...