The ion microprobe offers great advantages over previous methods to glean natural tracer information out of rocks.
This information is lost in traditional processing, but retained with ion microprobe analysis because the rock is not broken up.
The ion microprobe has two basic parts: the ion-beam source, which focuses and directs microbeams of ions onto the sample; and the mass spectrometer, which measures the signal intensities (abundances) of ions ejected from the sample.
The ion microprobe adds new dimensions to our analyses for two reasons.
The ion microprobe at WHOI precisely measures very small amounts of isotopes in rocks and other samples, revealing hidden clues about how our planet works.
The WHOI ion microprobe is helping researchers shed light on a fundamental, but still largely unknown process that shapes our planet--how rock deep beneath mid-ocean ridges melts to form magmas, and how the melted rock then migrates toward Earth's surface at the ridges.
Researchers could not have analyzed such small quantities with conventional geochemical techniques, but the ion microprobe enabled researchers to determine lanthanide abundance patterns in samples and demonstrate this type of melting.
We can study more than rocks with the ion microprobe.
For the hurricane studies, they use the ion microprobe to determine the ratio of two stable isotopes of oxygen in the carbonate.