Coupled measurements with chemical pre-separation of the gaseous sample by gas chromatography and subsequent analysis by our time-of-flight type Neutral Gas Mass Spectrometer, NGMS, were performed successfully with a prototype instrument for the Luna-Resurs mission. Both a mixture of hydrocarbons and a noble gas mixture were tested successfully.
While a GC–MS measurement is running, NGMS is able to record continuously mass spectra of the GC output over the full mass range to maximise the possible chemical information from the sample. In GC–MS mode the integration time per mass spectrum and therewith the sampling frequency of the GC output by NGMS can be chosen between 100 ms and 1 s. This gives the possibility to choose a shorter integration time in the beginning of the chromatogram to sample the less retained and therefore narrower GC peaks with a sufficient amount of data points. Due to the high sensitivity and the large dynamic range of the mass spectrometer of up to 106, we can detect volatiles of about 2·10−10 by mass in the soil sample for hydrocarbons and 2·10−9 by mass for noble gases with the prototype setup of the GC–MS instrument. For comparison, a sensitivity of 6·10−10 by mass for organic compounds has been quoted for the SAM flight instrument on the Curiosity rover (Mahaffy et al., 2012).
Due to the successful measurements with the NGMS prototype the development of the flight design for NGMS was accomplished and currently the manufacturing of flight hardware is in progress to be ready for flying to the Moon.
Coupled measurements with chemical pre-separation of the gaseous sample by gas chromatography and subsequent analysis by our time-of-flight type Neutral Gas Mass Spectrometer, NGMS, were performed successfully with a prototype instrument for the Luna-Resurs mission. Both a mixture of hydrocarbons and a noble gas mixture were tested successfully.While a GC–MS measurement is running, NGMS is able to record continuously mass spectra of the GC output over the full mass range to maximise the possible chemical information from the sample. In GC–MS mode the integration time per mass spectrum and therewith the sampling frequency of the GC output by NGMS can be chosen between 100 ms and 1 s. This gives the possibility to choose a shorter integration time in the beginning of the chromatogram to sample the less retained and therefore narrower GC peaks with a sufficient amount of data points. Due to the high sensitivity and the large dynamic range of the mass spectrometer of up to 106, we can detect volatiles of about 2·10−10 by mass in the soil sample for hydrocarbons and 2·10−9 by mass for noble gases with the prototype setup of the GC–MS instrument. For comparison, a sensitivity of 6·10−10 by mass for organic compounds has been quoted for the SAM flight instrument on the Curiosity rover (Mahaffy et al., 2012).Due to the successful measurements with the NGMS prototype the development of the flight design for NGMS was accomplished and currently the manufacturing of flight hardware is in progress to be ready for flying to the Moon.
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