A fast integrated mobility spectrometer with wide dynamic size range: Theoretical analysis and numerical simulation

A fast integrated mobility spectrometer with wide size range (WSR-FIMS) is described. The WSR-FIMS greatly enhances the dynamic size range of the original FIMS [Kulkarni, P., & Wang, J. (2006a). New fast integrated mobility spectrometer for real-time measurement of aerosol size distribution-I: Concept and theory. Journal of Aerosol Science, 37, 1303-1325; Kulkarni, P., & Wang, J. (2006b). New fast integrated mobility spectrometer for real-time measurement of aerosol size distribution-II: Design, calibration, and performance characterization. Journal of Aerosol Science, 37, 1326-1339] by employing a non-uniform electric field. The strength of this electric field varies over three orders of magnitude along the width of the separator, allowing particles of a much wider size range to be classified and measured simultaneously. A theoretical framework is developed to derive the transfer function, resolution, and transmission efficiency of the WSR-FIMS. Two representative operation configurations are simulated, and the results show the WSR-FIMS can simultaneously measure particles ranging from 10 to 1470 nm, therefore greatly reducing the measurement time from minutes required by scanning mobility particle sizer (SMPS) to 1 s or less. The WSR-FIMS also has a higher size resolution than typical SMPS over most of its measurement size range. For typical ambient aerosols, the simulations show that 1 s measurements using the WSR-FIMS provide good counting statistics.