As a main research line of the ICER project we plan to install a new multicollector ICP mass spectrometer in a clean laboratory milieu for the precise measurement of different isotope ratios.
These isotope ratios are very important not only for the exact dating of the geological samples, but also they give more informations for the climate reconstruction. One of the most successful research group in this topic works at Xi’An Jiaotong University, China. After some mailing with Professor Cheng’s group, we arrived at Xi’An on 15th of January, and we stayed for a week there. From Monday til Friday we got to know how the things are going in a C1000 clean laboratory, for example what to wear in a clean lab, how to do the cleanup and the washing-up, how to do the acid distillation process, how to clean the resin and fill the columns which are used for the separation of uranium and thorium from the solution and from each other. We brought 8 samples to date, so we spent two days with the preparation process, and another day with measuring on the Neptune Plus MC-ICP-MS. On Friday we got some information about heating, ventillation and air conditioning technique in the clean laboratory. After that we visited the Stable Isotope Laboratory which is equipped with a MAT 253 Plus clumped isotope mass spectrometer and a Kiel IV carbonate device.