Pb-isotope analyses of USGS reference materials

Abstract

Conventional corrections for thermal ionisation mass spectrometer (TIMS) induced Pb-isotopic fractionation often result in a loss of accuracy because the commonly employed pure Pb reference materials (NIST SRM 981, 982) frequently exhibit markedly different fractionation behaviour to real geological samples. As a result, these SRMs are inappropriate for comparison and/or correction of inter-operator/ laboratory biases. A "matrix-matched" reference material would be preferable but, as yet, no systematic study has approached this problem. Here we present high quality Pb-isotope ratio determinations, obtained using a double spike procedure, for six USGS reference materials in an attempt to addr..