Radiocarbon dating samples Radiocarbon dating samples Samples used for radiocarbon dating must be handled carefully to avoid contamination. Not all material can be dated by this method; only samples containing organic matter can be tested: the date found will be the date of death of the plants or animals from which the sample originally came. Samples for dating need to be converted into a form suitable for measuring the content; this can mean conversion to gaseous, liquid, or solid form, depending on the measurement technique to be used. Before this can be done, however, the sample must be treated to remove any contamination
Hydrogen isotope biogeochemistry measurement nowadays. The commercial products of GC-IRMS include both combustion and pyrolysis interfaces so that δC and δD can be measured simultaneously. The significant advantage of GC/pyrolysis method for hydrogen isotope measurement is that it can separate different compounds in the samples. It requires the smallest sample size (a typical size of ~ 200 ng) relative to other methods and also has a high precision of 1~5 ‰. But this method is relatively slow and limited to the samples which can be applied in GC system. Laser Spectroscopy (or Cavity ring-down spectroscopy, CRDS) is able to directly measure D/H, O/O