Scanning Transmission X-ray microscopy Imaging of Aerosol Particles

Scanning transmission x-ray microscopes (STXM) are used to image a diversity of carbon and metal containing items such as biofilms in soils, magnetic materials, polymers and meteorites. Studies on particles collected on SiO2 filters from biomass burns in Flagstaff, Arizona and individual aerosols collected in South Africa on TEM grids are underway at beamlines 5.3.2 and 11.0.2 at the Advanced Light Source of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Sub micron particles are imaged in the transmission mode over the energy range of 280 - 1900 eV. Spectromicroscopic studies on individual particles using near edge x-ray absorption fine structure (NEXAFS) probe multiple species within or on the same particle. In (STXM) an X-ray beam is focused with a zone plate onto a sample and the transmitted radiation is detected. Since the signal is obtained in the transmission mode, optically thin samples are required. Hence, atmospheric aerosols with submicron thickness and diameter are well suited for this method. Near edge spectra of various elements were scanned in step sizes from 0.1-0.5 eV around characteristic absorption edges, creating 2 dimensional images at each energy. While STXM images are taken with a lower spatial resolution (currently 40 nm) than microscopies such as scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscopy, and atomic force microscopy, detailed chemical information with spatial distributions, and oxidation states is obtained. A particular focus of this work is to obtain more detailed information on the type of carbons, multiply, or singly bonded and whether or not carbon is bonded to oxygen. The ultimate goal is discrimination between organic and black carbon within individual aerosol particles and determining if organic carbon, black carbon, and metal species are distributed homogeneously throughout aerosol particles. Initial scans of the samples from Flagstaff show spectral evidence of aromatic carbon, without distinct C=O signatures. NEXAFS spectra of the boundary haze from South Africa indicate the presence of both metal (Fe in multiple oxidation states) and carbon.