Effects of cathode heating in a GDMS system

In this note we present experimental results that show a strong influence of the sample (cathode) temperature on the electrical properties of the glow discharge in a commercial GDMS (glow discharge mass spectrometry) system. These results have implications for accurate calibration of GDMS systems. The original motivation for this work was to better understand the influence of the sample material on the electrical and analytical behavior of discharges for GDMS so that more control over the quantification/calibration is possible.