Public Funding for Applied Photonics Ltd

Applied Photonics Ltd (APL) was established in 1998 and specialises in a technique known as Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS) for elemental analysis of materials. LIBS has unique attributes including high speed and the ability to be deployed in hostile envronments including high radiation areas. APL has developed a range of LIBS products and services and has customers in more than 30 countries around the world. The objective of this project is to transition APL’s submersible LIBS probe technology to nuclear decommissioning and clean-up activities. To date, the submersible LIBS probe has been used in a marine environment to perform in-situ elemental analysis of submerged objects. In principle, it is capable of characterising submerged radioactive materials of the forms expected to be present in various redundant spent-fuel storage ponds at Sellafield and elsewhere, but will require “nuclearisation” so as to make it suitable for deployment in this environment and capable of identifying radioactive waste and other materials of interest to nuclear decommissioning operations.