The upgraded external-beam PIXE/PIGE set-up at LABEC for very fast measurements on aerosol samples

At the 3 MV Tandetron accelerator of the LABEC laboratory of INFN in Florence, an external beam facility is fully dedicated to measurements of elemental composition of atmospheric aerosol. The experimental set-up hitherto used for this kind of applications has been upgraded with the replacement of a traditional Si(Li) detector for the detection of medium–high Z elements with a silicon drift detector (SDD) with a big active area (80 mm2) and 450 μm thickness, with the aim of obtaining better minimum detection limits (MDL) and reduce measuring times. The Upilex extraction window has been replaced by a more resistant one (Si3N4). A comparison between the old Si(Li) and the new SDD for aerosol samples collected on different substrata like Teflon, Kapton and Nuclepore evidenced the better performances of the SDD. It allows obtaining better results (higher counting statistics, lower MDLs) even in shorter measuring times, thus allowing very fast analysis of both daily and hourly samples