Calibration of a spectrometer involves reproducing known absorption peaks of standard materials to ensure measurement accuracies in a given spectral region.  A terahertz spectrometer deploys time-domain measurement where the sample response resulting from the molecular interaction is recorded in time; the spectrum is then obtained by means of converting the time-domain signal by Fourier transform. Here, the absorbance is expected to exhibit established peaks of known standards.  In this paper we report calibration of TeraSpectra with polyethylene.  While several known peaks of PE have been reproduced, however, TeraSpectra yields additional peaks � owing to its ultra-sensitivity � whose justification may or may not be known.  These additional peaks arise because THz radiation is sensitive to resonances due to motions such as translational, rotational, vibrational, torsional, etc.  Additional peaks are thus expected and justify the emergence of a new spectrometer where indeed additional information is generated that are not available from its predecessors.

Terahertz time-domain spectrometer calibration and data analysis

244th National Meeting (2012)

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