Latest version changes for Probe for EPMA (and CalcImage) v. 14.3.7

[John Donovan]

The latest v. 14.3.6 of Probe for EPMA now includes a pdf document accessed from the Help menu, which explains our very unintuitive method for PHA tuning for high accuracy microanalysis.  Even when extrapolating from pure metals or pure oxides to alloys/sulfides or oxides/silicates, respectively.



Of course this also requires that one has properly calibrated their dead time constants (and using the logarithmic dead time equation in Probe for EPMA), because we are no longer "count rate matching" our standard to our unknown.

And of course for large atomic number extrapolations, we require the Donovan and Moy Z based backscatter correction as described here by Andrew Locock:

https://smf.probesoftware.com/index.php?topic=40.msg13051#msg13051

See also here for many examples of ~1% or better relative accuracy in most of these "Xtreme" extrapolations:

https://smf.probesoftware.com/index.php?topic=1831.0

All of this assumes that your WDS spectrometers are mechanically aligned, which can be chcked using the Bragg order k-ratio test:

https://smf.probesoftware.com/index.php?topic=1739.0

[John Donovan]

Here's something new.

We added a new field in the manual PHA tuning window as seen here:



By default it loads the current sample (as displayed in the list), but you can edit this field to change the text to maybe the sample you're actually on, or perhaps to other comments. This material name and/or comments are now displayed in the Run | Display, Fit and Export Spectrometer and PHA scans menu dialog as seen here:



This field was previously only utilized when performing peaking/PHA acquisitions from the Automate! window, but now one can add comments to this field when manually tuning the PHAs.

Update Probe for EPMA from the Help menu as usual.

[John Donovan]

Here's a new feature in the Output | Output Standard and Unknown XY Plots menu:



If you have the Standards option selected for the sample list there are now three new entries for each analyzed element: published values, percent variances and algebraic differences. These are the same parameters seen in the log window output:

St  162 Set  12 NBS K-411 mineral glass, Results in Elemental Weight Percents
 
ELEM:       Ti      Fe      Sr      Rb      Mn      Cr      Si      Mg      Ca      Al       O
TYPE:     ANAL    ANAL    SPEC    SPEC    SPEC    SPEC    SPEC    SPEC    SPEC    SPEC    SPEC
BGDS:      LIN     LIN
TIME:    60.00   60.00     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---
BEAM:    19.94   19.94     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---

ELEM:       Ti      Fe      Sr      Rb      Mn      Cr      Si      Mg      Ca      Al       O   SUM  
  1175    .003  11.156    .000    .000    .077    .000  25.382   8.847  11.057    .053  43.558 100.133
  1176    .003  11.146    .000    .000    .077    .000  25.382   8.847  11.057    .053  43.558 100.123
  1177    .005  11.160    .000    .000    .077    .000  25.382   8.847  11.057    .053  43.558 100.139
  1178    .002  11.177    .000    .000    .077    .000  25.382   8.847  11.057    .053  43.558 100.153
  1179    .001  11.157    .000    .000    .077    .000  25.382   8.847  11.057    .053  43.558 100.131
  1180   -.002  11.122    .000    .000    .077    .000  25.382   8.847  11.057    .053  43.558 100.094

AVER:     .002  11.153    .000    .000    .077    .000  25.382   8.847  11.057    .053  43.558 100.129
SDEV:     .002    .018    .000    .000    .000    .000    .000    .000    .000    .000    .000    .020
SERR:     .001    .007    .000    .000    .000    .000    .000    .000    .000    .000    .000
%RSD:   108.44     .16     .00     .00     .00     .00     .00     .00     .00     .00     .00

PUBL:     n.a.  11.209    n.a.    n.a.    .077    n.a.  25.382   8.847  11.057    .053  43.558 100.183
%VAR:      ---    -.50     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---
DIFF:      ---   -.056     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---
STDS:       22     395     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---

STKF:    .5626   .6867     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---
STCT:  1833.94 1035.28     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---

UNKF:    .0000   .0965     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---
UNCT:      .05  145.51     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---
UNBG:     2.68    1.50     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---

ZCOR:   1.1794  1.1556     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---
KRAW:    .0000   .1405     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---
PKBG:     1.02   98.03     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---     ---

Now we can make plots like this:



Note the chromite is a natural sample of uncertain composition.  And also this with a different x axis: