Abstract: A device for continuous analysis of the composition of a gaseous atmosphere containing particles of material in suspension includes a burner equipped with a prism; an intensifier which produces an intensified image of the spectrum produced by the dispersive component on photodiodes; a register which stores data detected by the photodiodes; a microcomputer which periodically reads the register and compares the data read with reference data to identify the elements looked for; and a counter which counts the number of times that the same component is identified per unit time in order to determine the number of particles per unit volume. The device can be implemented in the form of a portable, self-contained apparatus.