Space-qualified laser system for the BepiColombo Laser Altimeter

The space-qualified design of a miniaturized laser for pulsed operation at a wavelength of 1064 nm and at repetition rates up to 10 Hz is presented. This laser consists of a pair of diode-laser pumped, actively q-switched Nd:YAG rod oscillators hermetically sealed and encapsulated in an environment of dry synthetic air. The system delivers at least 300 million laser pulses with 50 mJ energy and 5 ns pulse width (FWHM). It will be launched in 2017 aboard European Space Agency’s Mercury Planetary Orbiter as part of the BepiColombo Laser Altimeter, which, after a 6-years cruise, will start recording topographic data from orbital altitudes between 400 and 1500 km above Mercury’s surface.

Mode-locked diode-pumped vanadate lasers operated with PbS quantum dots

The use of glasses doped with PbS nanocrystals as intracavity saturable absorbers for passive Q-switching and mode locking of c-cut Nd:Gd0.7Y0.3VO4, Nd:YVO4, and Nd:GdVO4 lasers is investigated. Q-switching yields pulses as short as 35 ns with an average output power of 435 mW at a repetition rate of 6–12 kHz at a pump power of 5–6 W. Mode locking through a combination of PbS nanocrystals and a Kerr lens results in 1.4 ps long pulses with an average output power of 255 mW at a repetition rate of 100 MHz.

Detection and identification of 700 drugs by multi-target screening with a 3200 Q TRAP LC-MS/MS system and library searching

The multi-target screening method described in this work allows the simultaneous detection and identification of 700 drugs and metabolites in biological fluids using a hybrid triple-quadrupole linear ion trap mass spectrometer in a single analytical run. After standardization of the method, the retention times of 700 compounds were determined and transitions for each compound were selected by a "scheduled" survey MRM scan, followed by an information-dependent acquisition using the sensitive enhanced product ion scan of a Q TRAP hybrid instrument. The identification of the compounds in the samples analyzed was accomplished by searching the tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS) spectra against the library we developed, which contains electrospray ionization-MS/MS spectra of over 1,250 compounds. The multi-target screening method together with the library was included in a software program for routine screening and quantitation to achieve automated acquisition and library searching. With the help of this software application, the time for evaluation and interpretation of the results could be drastically reduced. This new multi-target screening method has been successfully applied for the analysis of postmortem and traffic offense samples as well as proficiency testing, and complements screening with immunoassays, gas chromatography-mass spectrometry, and liquid chromatography-diode-array detection. Other possible applications are analysis in clinical toxicology (for intoxication cases), in psychiatry (antidepressants and other psychoactive drugs), and in forensic toxicology (drugs and driving, workplace drug testing, oral fluid analysis, drug-facilitated sexual assault).