Development of an Autonomous Ammonium Fluorescence Sensor (AAFS) with a View Towards In-situ Application.

摘要

Our goal is to develop a portable autonomous ammonium sensor. Such a sensor could be deployed for periods of up to a month aboard ships, moorings or drifting buoys or used as a component in lowered or towed oceanographic instrument packages for vertical profiling. Our technical objective is to develop a robust, relatively simple, inexpensive, low power and compact instrument with a detection limit in the nM range and a sampling frequency of at least 4 samples per hour. Robustness, simplicity, low construction cost, lower power and small size are the practical desiderata for commercial application. Commercialization and the lowered instrument costs that will result are essential to permit wider application throughout the oceanographic community.