Detector, linear photomultiplier

This book has wide variety of topics in spectroscopy including spectrophotometric apparatus and techniques. Topics covered absorption, emissions, scattering, causes of non-linearity, monochromators, detectors, photocells, photomultipliers, differential spectrophotometry, spectrophotometric titration, single beam, dual and multi wave length spectrophotometry, and diode array spectrophotometers. 

The experiment is performed with a spectrofluorometer similar to the ones used for linear fluorescence and quantum yield measurements (Sect. 2.1). The excitation, instead of a regular lamp, is done using femtosecond pulses, and the detector (usually a photomultiplier tube or an avalanche photodiode) must either have a very low dark current (usually true for UV-VIS detectors but not for the NIR), or to be gated at the laser repetition rate. Figure 11 shows a simplified schematic for the 2PF technique. 

The photomultiplier tube a very sensitive device that has a linear response over seven decades - has for a long time been the most widely used detector in spectrophotometers. Its efficiency depends on the yield of the photocathode, which varies with wavelength (e.g. 0.1 e /photon at 750 nm). and with the signal gain provided by the dynode cascade (e.g. gain of 6 x 105). With such values, the impact of 10000 photons per second produces a current of 0.1 nA. 

In 1986, Foret et al.41 described an on-line UV absorbance detector that employed a commercial photometer and optical fibers in direct contact with the outer walls of the separation capillary. The optical fibers (200 (im I.D. fused silica core) conducted the light beam perpendicularly across the migrating zones one fiber was connected to a mercury lamp to serve as the illumination source, and the other directed light to a photomultiplier tube for detection. The detector was found to be linear in the range of 10"5 to 10 3 M (r = 0.994 for 10 measurements), with detection limits of 1 X 10 5 M for picric acid (S/N = 2). 

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