Biography
Maurice Brodbeck is a postdoctoral researcher in the iCRAG raw material research challenge. His fields of interest include geochemistry, petrology and economic geology. Maurice graduated with a BSc and an MSc in geoscience from the University of Tübingen, before joining iCRAG in January 2016. Maurice graduated with a PhD in geology from Trinity College Dublin in 2020. He studied the distribution of energy critical elements in porphyry copper deposits.
I am running the raw materials laboratory of the geology department at Trinity College Dublin. With our facilities we can analyse trace element concentrations in all kind of materials, such as ore, magmatic, metamorphic and sedimentary minerals. This helps us to understand the formation history of rocks, their age, and whether they contain valuable metals, or elements that are harmful for the environment. My research focuses on analytical method development, with the aim to broaden the scope of our laboratory and to produce even more accurate data.
Technical Description
Part of my role as a postdoctoral researcher is to operate the LA-ICP-MS/OES facility of the geology department at TCD. Thereby l am training and assisting researchers in data acquisition and processing to address iCRAG’s various challenges. My research focuses on method development, in particular on the techniques to analyse non-traditional matrices, such as sulphides and carbon-based materials by LA-ICP-MS/OES. Commonly used reference materials have different ablation behaviour to non-traditional matrices. The absence of appropriate calibration materials for these matrices leads to a systematic bias. Hence, I am characterising natural sulphides and aim to produce synthetic doped sulphides to determine their usefulness as standard materials. The project also targets to establish fully quantitative LA-ICP-MS mapping of heterogenous and multiphase samples. This will be achieved by integrating spatially identical major element ICP-OES data into the LA-ICP-MS data reduction. This approach will make time consuming prior micron-beam analysis unnecessary.
Role
- Postdoctoral Researcher
Institution
- TCD
Research Area
- Earth Resources
Expertise
- Critical Materials
