Glow Discharge Mass Spectrometry (GDMS) is a very sensitive and robust analytical tool for monitoring elemental compositions and impurities in materials down to trace and ultra-trace mass fraction levels. It is a high resolution mass spectrometric technique, which is based on glow discharge atomization/ionization source combined with sector-field mass analyzer. Besides full survey elemental coverage, depth specific distributions of elements can be evaluated with very high sensitivity if measurements are conducted in flat sampling geometry.

Unknown or unwanted impurities in materials often cause “irritating” distractions for materials scientists or engineers. Thus, higher purity materials are preferred in order to eliminate unwanted defects, which could affect performance, reliability, lifetime and safety in general. On the other hand, intentionally added impurities into materials can introduce energy levels previously not assessable by electrons, photons, phonons, atoms and molecules, thus creating vast opportunities for discovering new phenomena for property tailoring. GDMS is a powerful tool for impurity analysis.