Quantum cascade laser-based reflectance spectroscopy: a robust approach for the classification of plastic type

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2020-05-28Author
Michel, Anna P. M.
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Morrison, Alexandra E.
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Colson, Beckett C.
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Pardis, William A.
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Moya, Xavier A.
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Harb, Charles C.
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White, Helen K.
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https://hdl.handle.net/1912/26025As published
https://doi.org/10.1364/OE.393231DOI
10.1364/OE.393231Abstract
The identification of plastic type is important for environmental applications ranging from recycling to understanding the fate of plastics in marine, atmospheric, and terrestrial environments. Infrared reflectance spectroscopy is a powerful approach for plastics identification, requiring only optical access to a sample. The use of visible and near-infrared wavelengths for plastics identification are limiting as dark colored plastics absorb at these wavelengths, producing no reflectance spectra. The use of mid-infrared wavelengths instead enables dark plastics to be identified. Here we demonstrate the capability to utilize a pulsed, widely-tunable (5.59 - 7.41 µm) mid-infrared quantum cascade laser, as the source for reflectance spectroscopy, for the rapid and robust identification of plastics. Through the application of linear discriminant analysis to the resulting spectral data set, we demonstrate that we can correctly classify five plastic types: polyethylene terephthalate (PET), high density polyethylene (HDPE), low density polyethylene (LDPE), polypropylene (PP), and polystyrene (PS), with a 97% accuracy rate.
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© The Author(s), 2020. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Michel, A. P. M., Morrison, A. E., Colson, B. C., Pardis, W. A., Moya, X. A., Harb, C. C., & White, H. K. Quantum cascade laser-based reflectance spectroscopy: a robust approach for the classification of plastic type. Optics Express, 28(12), (2020): 17741-17756, doi:10.1364/OE.393231.
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Michel, A. P. M., Morrison, A. E., Colson, B. C., Pardis, W. A., Moya, X. A., Harb, C. C., & White, H. K. (2020). Quantum cascade laser-based reflectance spectroscopy: a robust approach for the classification of plastic type. Optics Express, 28(12), 17741-17756.The following license files are associated with this item: