Evaluation of femtosecond LIBS for spectrochemical microanalysis of aluminium alloys.

The analytical performance of femtosecond laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) for elemental microanalysis of aluminium alloys and for mapping precipitate distribution on the sample surface has been studied in detail. A Ti-sapphire laser system producing pulses of 130 fs at 800 nm was used to generate the laser-induced plasma. Multi-element microanalysis of commercially available aluminium alloys was performed in air at atmospheric pressure.