Abstract
Trace level detection of nitric oxide (NO) is of great interest for a wide range of applications such as environment and human health. For this purpose, a high sensitive sensor based photoacoustic spectroscopy (PAS) principle has been developed at our laboratory for detection of NO at very low concentration (ppbV). For optimization of the PAS signal and to achieve higher sensitivity, parametric dependence investigation was carried out where PAS signal dependence on NO gas pressure, cell geometry, buffer gas (Ar, N-2, He), and laser pulse energy used three PAS cells developed locally. The best sensitivity achieved with three cells was 41, 11, 20 ppbv, respectively. It is worth reporting that the best PAS signal to noise ratio was achieved by using a cylindrical cell having three acoustic filters and argon as a buffer gas. (c) 2012 Optical Society of America