Detection and analysis of chemical and biological aerosols

摘要

A system for detecting and analyzing chemical and biological aerosols is described. A beam of radiation (20) is used to radiate a target cloud (12) including the aerosol. The radiation energy that is absorbed by the cloud is thermalized by collisional energy transfer between the molecules that absorb the radiation to generate heat. The wavelength of the electromagnetic radiation is selected to be in resonance with the absorption lines of water or oxygen molecules in the cloud, or to be in resonance with absorption lines of known target molecules in the cloud to generate the heat. An increase in the cloud temperature increases the emission intensity of the molecules against the background, resulting in improved detection of the target molecules in the aerosol. A tracking telescope (16) collects the thermal emissions generated by the radiation beam. A spectrometer (18) receives the emissions from the cloud and generates an emission spectrum. In addition to this remote sensing setup a further embodiment is described wherein the aerosol is contained in a sample chamber. <IMAGE>