Eur. Phys. J. D (2016) 70: 154
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjd/e2016-70264-8

Regular Article

A smog chamber study coupling a photoionization aerosol electron/ion spectrometer to VUV synchrotron radiation: organic and inorganic-organic mixed aerosol analysis^*,**

¹ Escuela de Ingeniería Industrial de Toledo, Universidad de Castilla la Mancha, Avenida Carlos III s/n, Real Fábrica de Armas, 45071 Toledo, Spain
² Synchrotron SOLEIL, L’Orme des Merisiers, St Aubin, BP 48, 91192 Gif-sur-Yvette Cedex, France
³ Université Versailles St-Quentin, UPMC Univ. Paris 06, CNRS, LATMOS, 11 Bd. d’Alembert, 78280 Guyancourt, France

^a e-mail: mariateresa.baeza@uclm.es
^b Current address: Laboratoire National de Métrologie et d’Essais (LNE), Chemistry and Biology Division, 1 rue Gaston Boissier, 75724 Paris Cedex 15, France

Received: 13 April 2016
Received in final form: 25 May 2016
Published online: 20 July 2016

Abstract

A reaction chamber was coupled to a photoionization aerosol time-of-flight mass spectrometer based on an electron/ion coincidence scheme and applied for on-line analysis of organic and inorganic-organic mixed aerosols using synchrotron tunable vacuum ultraviolet (VUV) photons as the ionization source. In this proof of principle study, both aerosol and gas phase were detected simultaneously but could be differentiated. Present results and perspectives for improvement for this set-up are shown in the study of ozonolysis ([O₃] = 0.13–3 ppm) of α-pinene (2–3 ppm), and the uptake of glyoxal upon ammonium sulphate. In this work the ozone concentration was monitored in real time, together with the particle size distributions and chemical composition, the latter taking advantage of the coincidence spectrometer and the tuneability of the synchrotron radiation as a soft VUV ionization source.