electron beam laboratory

 Our electron beam laboratory comprises two major platforms – an electron microprobe and a scanning electron microscope – plus all necessary preparation equipment.

The custom designed electron microprobe laboratory Cameca SX-100 electron microprobe equipped with 4 dual, large-area crystal spectrometers, a 4-crystal light element spectrometer, and a Rontec energy dispersive spectrometer. The SX-100 is capable of stage-scan and beam-scan, backscattered electron, secondary electron, and cathodoluminescence images and can simultaneously capture up to 13 x-ray compositional channels. The system is specially equipped with a dry high vacuum system and an anticontamination gas-stream/cold plate system necessary for long-duration minor element determinations. The system is operated with Cameca PC-based automation and data reduction software using PAP matrix corrections.

The scanning electron microscope (SEM) is a Tescan Vega-II XMU variable pressure instrument with a tungsten filament, 5-axis compucentric stage, resolution better than 5 nm, and secondary and backscattered electron detectors appropriate for the different vacuum conditions. Coupled to the electron microscope is an EDAX electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD) system, as well as Gatan ChromaCL full color and Tescan panchromatic cathodoluminescence (CL) imaging systems. EBSD hardware includes the Digiview IV camera with forward scatter detector. EBSD software includes acquisition, indexing, and post-processing components. The SEM has liquid nitrogen and Peltier-cooled stages with a transfer module that carries snow and ice samples from the preparation room and mounts on the cooling stage with no contact with ambient air.