Signatures of rare-earth elements in mineralogical form using laser-ablation dual-comb spectroscopy

This study investigates the feasibility of using laser-ablation dual-comb spectroscopy to identify rare earth elements (REEs) in real-time at a distance without any prior preparatory work within a particular mineralogy. This approach has significant implications for exploration geology, ore body mapping, and ore sorting. While laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) has previously detected the presence of REEs in rock samples using both atomic and molecular techniques, this study focuses on complementary absorption spectroscopy using dual-frequency combs. This technique provides large THz multi-range coverage with sub-GHz resolution, which increases the accuracy of line identification and confidence when analyzing complex multi-species spectra present in the mineralogical samples. The study focuses on the analysis

of REEs present in calibrated reference materials (CRMs) and a synthesized alloy containing REEs, targeted at atomic, ionic, and molecular oxide absortions across different spectral regions. Primary objectives include the detection of lines associated with rare earth and matrix elements, analysis of the absorption line strengths, and the study of their temporal evolution. Using univariate analysis of selected transitions, preliminary limits of detection were established for the CRMs for the REEs of La I, Sm I, and Ce I.

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