Hydrogeochemistry / Stable Isotope Facility

This facility supports a range of hydrogeochemistry and environmental geochemistry research. Projects carried out in this lab include investigating groundwater flow systems, groundwater-surface water interaction, water quality, and element cycling at the Earth’s surface.

Technical details

The Hydrogeochemistry lab hosts the following equipment.

Thermo Finnigan Delta Plus Advantage gas source mass spectrometer interfaced with a headspace analyser (Thermo Finnigan Gas Bench), Carlo-Erba elemental analyser, and a Thermo Finnigan H-Device. This equipment permits a wide range of stable isotope analysis, including O, C, H & S isotopes in waters, carbonates, gases, and organic matter.

Thermo iCAP 7400 Duo ICP-OES. This is used for analysis of major cations and trace elements in natural waters or laboratory solutions.

Thermo Fischer Ion Chromatograph. This equipment allows the determination of major anions in natural waters or laboratory solutions.

RAD-7 radon-in-air monitors. These allow the continuous or instantaneous determination of Rn activities in air or water samples either in the lab or the field.

A range of ancillary equipment (pH, EC, DO meters, filtration equipment, and digital titrators), which are used in the field or laboratory, and a dedicated sample preparation laboratory supports the research carried out in this facility.