Influence of photolysis on multispectral photoacoustic measurement of nitrogen dioxide concentration.

Multispectral photoacoustic instruments are commonly used to measure aerosol and nitrogen dioxide (NO2) light absorption coefficients to determine the radiation budget of the atmosphere. Here a new photoacoustic system is developed to explore the effect of photolysis on the measured signal in a multispectral photoacoustic spectrometer In this system, a 405-nm laser is used primarily as light source for photolysis. Additionally, a well-overlapped 532-nm laser, modulated at the resonant frequency of the photoacoustic instrument, is used to probe the NO2 concentration. As a result, the photolysis effect at 405 nm can be observed by the photoacoustic instrument through the 532-nm laser. This work determines an 11% reduction of the photoacoustic signal caused by the photolysis effect for typical conditions, which needs to be taken into account when calibrating multispectral photoacoustic spectrometers with NO2.

Low fractal dimension cluster-dilute soot aggregates from a premixed flame.

Using a novel morphology segregation technique, we observed minority populations ( approximately 3%) of submicron-sized, cluster-dilute fractal-like aggregates, formed in the soot-formation window (fuel-to-air equivalence ratio of 2.0-3.5) of a premixed flame, to have mass fractal dimensions between 1.2 and 1.51. Our observations disagree with previous observations of a universal mass fractal dimension of approximately 1.8 for fractal-like aerosol aggregates formed in the dilute-limit via three-dimensional diffusion-limited cluster aggregation processes. A hypothesis is presented to explain this observation. Subject to verification of this hypothesis, it may be possible to control the fractal dimension and associated properties of aggregates in the cluster-dilute limit through application of a static electric field during the aggregation process.

Two-chamber integrated multichannel narrowband filter prepared by a multistep etching method.

A new, to the best of our knowledge, method, which combines the multistep ion-etching method with a traditional narrowband filter coating technique, is developed to prepare a two-chamber integrated multichannel filter. The influence of film deposition and etch technique on the shape and height of the narrow transmittance peaks is analyzed. A 32-channel narrowband integrated filter is fabricated with a homemade ion-etching machine and a coating machine. Every channel is distinctly separated and the FWHM is 1% of its central wavelength. The feasibility of the technique will be useful in the fabrication of a higher integrated multichannel narrowband filter.