Advances in dielectric barrier discharge-optical emission spectrometry for the analysis of trace species

During the last few years, various miniaturized optical emission spectrometry (OES) systems based on dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) micro-plasma as a radiation source have gained novel advances and exhibited powerful capability in the field of trace elemental analysis. At the heart of such analytical systems, DBD micro-plasma possesses a series of unique features and it is a promising technique for the development of miniaturized atomic spectrometric instruments, including OES spectrometers. This mini-review presents and discusses the progress of DBD-OES systems in the analysis of gaseous species and those in an aqueous medium. In the case of gaseous species, the approaches are focused on direct detection by DBD-OES after appropriate sample introduction. For the case of analyzing target species in an aqueous medium, the entire analytical process includes a DBD-OES detection unit, electrothermal vaporization or a chemical vapor generation unit. Special emphasis has been focused on the novel applications of DBD-OES systems and its hyphenation with various analytical techniques. Future perspectives of DBD-OES systems for trace elemental analysis are described.