Aluminum-rich sphereules, possible sources?

Apollo20 said:
... If we wanted really accurate analytical data, especially for trace elements, we would use a destructive technique like atomic absorption spectroscopy in which the sample was dissolved in something like conc HCl (with a little added peroxide) and injected into the AA spectrometer followed by a certified standard. For example, to analyse for iron in the WTC dust you would use an iron emission lamp and compare the sample signal to say a 1000 ppm iron standard. You would then do Na, Ca, Al, Cr, Ni, Cu, Zn, etc, using the appropriate lamp and certified standard...
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Heheh... reminds me of the day we had to do GC in Organic lab (save for the fact we didn't need to worry about any emission lamps): Inject sample, inject standard. Analyze. Inject new sample, inject new standard. Analyze. And so on.

Anyway, thanks for the answer! Much appreciated.
 
You injected a standard each and every time you ran a sample?

In industry that is generally not how it is done. When you install and cook out a new column, you run calibration samples, post them on the wall or in the book that goes with the machine, and then you don't revisit calibration except once per quarter or so.

Then again, we were always looking for the same solvents each and every time, and we were not looking for an exact concentration so much as looking for almost no signal at all, indicating that the solvents were baked out of the film.

BTW, What we were doing was printing the graphics onto film to be used as meat packaging; If you ate any Carl Buddig meat in the last two years of the 1970s, I'm quite likely to be the QC engineer who approved the packaging. It was my first job out of college while I looked for something better.
 
The Almond said:
The scanning electron microprobe/microscope has two primary advantages in particle analysis:
1) The spot size of the electron beam is usually smaller than 5 micrometers in diameter, and often much smaller. This means that particles can be analyzed individually, even if those particles are only a few micrometers in diameter themselves. Techniques involving ion probes are difficult with such small particles. Bulk X-ray techniques, such as diffraction and fluorescence do not analyze the particles individually, but rather average the composition over the interaction volume.

2) EDX Spectrometry has enormous range in elemental identification and quantification. Particle quantification following either Small's or Armstrong's models can lead to very accurate results (+/- 1-3% relative or better). In truth, the only thing EDAX isn't really good for is identification of large polymers and hydrocarbons.

To summarize: You need an electron microscope to see the particles, and you're already getting the X-rays out of the particles as you're looking at them, so you might as analyze the X-rays in the process.
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Excellent, and thank you. I didn't know a thing about EDAX; this helps me begin to understand it.

The Almond said:
I don't think you can necessarily compare spectrochemcial analysis techniques to each other. It's apples and oranges.
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Well, yes, that's true. But I was going after applicability of a method in a give circumstance; again, my exposure to spectrometric analysis is very limited, and I didn't know what range of methods were available. Using my very thin undergrad chemistry background, I of course realize that you don't do TLC when you're trying to get atomic bond information, which is something NMR is far more suitable for; TLC and NMR is indeed an apples to passionfruit :D comparison. But, there are other chromatographic methods where the finer points of the differences are not immediately obvious, and I thought that this might be the case with EDAX and other sorts of spectrometric methods. If not, I learned something new anyway, and the post is still not a loss.

Again, my thanks for the information. :thanks
 
BenBurch said:
You injected a standard each and every time you ran a sample?
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Maybe we're just having terminology problems. I didn't mean to say that we were recalibrating on each injection. Rather, I was saying that the lab instructor once had us compare very pure, single compound samples - i.e. one simple chain like ethene, one simple aromatic like cyclohexane, etc. (plus their solvents, when needed) - to the output of a "mixed" sample (i.e. two or more compounds). The pure, "simple" sample was the "standard", to which we compared the output from the "mixed" sample. We'd then have to identify the peak that corresponded to that single compound in the "mixed" sample's output (easy when the peaks are well differentiated, but that wasn't always the case). And then we were asked questions like: Why did this other molecule's peak appear ahead of the "standard's" one, what can the peak tell us about it, etc.

I remember that as being far more enjoyable than the day we had to calculate the areas under the peaks. I'm tellin ya, there's a reason I'm not a chemist. :eye-poppi:D
 
leftysergeant said:
I was emptying wastebaskets at an office building that my wife and I clean and for some reason, it popped into my mind that at one time many recyclers would not accept carbonless copying paper because they were considered hazmat. I remembered having read that at one time they contained heavy metals, including nickel, which may have been erroneous information. So, when I got home, I googled carbonless paper and found it to contain some really ghastly organic compounds and one that I had not expected, kaolin. Kaolin is a clay formed by the decomposition by weathering of feldspar, an alumino silicate mineral. It is used in fine ceramics and as a coating on high-gloss paper. There had to be tons of it in one product or another in the WTC. And a lot of it was exposed to fire.

I then googled aluminum minerals of other sorts and found something I hadn't seen before. It seems that alumina powder is used as a "phosphor precurser" in flourescent lights. Hmmm....

Alumina is apparently also used in some sorts of powder coating. I will leave it to someone who knows a little more about metal working than I to come up with uses to which it might have been put in the towers. I'm sure there were many.

I am now wondering whether S. Jones' "aluminum-rich" sphereules were alumina, of perhaps some other coumpound. Did his analytical method test for specific compounds and elements, and could the material have been aluminum silicate? If so, we have a source for that that has nothing at all to do with thermite.
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Yes however that leaves the iron source out, since aluminum Silicates are in all organics, a better source for the spheres is brown paper.
http://www.freepatentsonline.com/5976322.html

Here is what I tried, something similar to what is in this patent and was successful.

http://www.freepatentsonline.com/4363789.html

It is not a question of being able to form the spheres just a question of what is the right base materials, and without a more detailed Information on the spheres we just do not know what the base materials are.
 
ElMondoHummus said:
I remember that as being far more enjoyable than the day we had to calculate the areas under the peaks. I'm tellin ya, there's a reason I'm not a chemist. :eye-poppi:D
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Did nobody tell you how to cheat at that???

Simple.

Take the recorder paper you have and cut out a sample ten squares on a side.

This is 100 units.

Weigh it.

Divide by 100 to get the weight of a unit.

Very carefully cut out the graph you need the area under.

Weight that.

Divide by the weight of the unit.

If you are careful this can be very accurate, assuming you have a microgram scale.
 
Huntsman said:
Actually, wasn't there a still a significant question as to whether or not Jone's dust even came from the WTC? IIRC, it was brought to him by a third party (a citizen), quite some time after the towers had fallen, and she had pulled it from a windowsill. Anyone recall the details of this?
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Janette MacKinlay vacuumed her apartment and held onto the dust for several years. She's also the source for Jones' little bits of iron that he holds up at Troofer conventions; I believe her boyfriend (a sculptor) did one of the memorials from WTC steel.

She's also thoroughly nutty; she's one of the "nukes at the WTC" fruitcakes and associates herself with "modified attack baboons" Bill Deagle.
 
Well that sure is a dandy chain of custody for a piece of evidence in the crime of the century.
 
Apollo,

Thanks for the clarification. I assumed it was akin to gamma photons passing through a scintillation detector, causing luminescence when they interact with various phosphors. I suppose the two interactions are similar.
 
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Thank you, Brianster. I recalled it was something along those lines.

So, the only evidecne this dust had anything to do with the WTC at all is because some random woman (who was already one of the conspiracy crowd and promoting provably absurd theories) says so?

I think this horse not only failed to make it out of the gate, it's wandered over to the concession stand for a corn dog.
 
BenBurch said:
Did nobody tell you how to cheat at that???
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Ummm... admittedly, no. :o And I never thought of that myself. I just tried to be a good lil' student and follow the directions as they were given.

We all of course know that adherence to the absolute letter of instructions is inversely proportional to any actual knowledge of the subject. ;)
 
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