Thermal ionisation mass spectrometry (TIMS) in nuclear science and technology - a review

The advances which have taken place during the last four decades in the instrumentation and applications of thermal ionisation mass spectrometry (TIMS) particularly of relevance to nuclear science and technology are highlighted. These include the measurements at different stages of the nuclear fuel cycle including nuclear material accounting, nuclear safeguards and nuclear forensics. The present day availability of fully automated TIMS instruments equipped with multi Faraday cup detectors has enhanced the capabilities of providing answers to many of the previous un-solved problems, but at the same time, these instruments are being treated as magic black boxes by operators performing routine analysis. The advances in the instrumentation as well as in the software available with the present TIMS machines allow us to venture into hitherto unexplored areas of R&D including the precise and accurate determination of ultra-trace amounts of different isotopes. TIMS along with isotope dilution will continue to be a gold standard and reference analytical method for various applications in nuclear science. MC-ICP-MS will play a complementary role to the present TIMS measurements, especially for routine analysis of actinides at different stages of nuclear fuel fabrication, burn-up determination and at the reprocessing plants.