EnvironMICADAS C-14 AMS Gas ion source performance and its applications at HEKAL Laboratory, Debrecen, Hungary

A coupled accelerator mass spectrometer - gas interface system successfully has been operating at the Hertelendi Laboratory of Environmental Studies, Debrecen, Hungary since 2013. Over the last 6 years more than 500 gas targets were measured below 100 µg carbon content for carbon isotopic composition. The system was tested with blanks, OxII, IAEA-C1, IAEA-C2 and IAEA-C7 standards. The performance of our instrumentation shows good agreement with other published gas-interface system data and also shows a quite good agreement with the nominal value of international standard samples.  There is a measurable but quite small memory effect after modern samples, but this does not significantly affect the final results. Typical ion currents at the low energy side were between 10-15 µA with a 5% CO₂ in He mixing ratio. The relative errors average ±6% for samples greater than or equal to 10 µgC sample with mean count rates of 300 counts per microgram C for OxII. The blank is comparable with other systems, which is 0.0050 ± 0.0018 F¹⁴C or 34000-47000 yr BP, which allows for the routine measurement of both of small environmental and archeological samples.

The research was supported by the European Union and the State of Hungary, co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund in the project of GINOP-2.3.2-15-2016- 00009 “ICER”. This work was carried out in the frame of the János Bolyai Research Scholarship (Mihály Molnár) of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences