Ultra High Vacuum Techniques and Experimentation in Materials Science

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Ultra high vacuum (UHV) techniques are becoming standard for the study of materials and surface problems. This project will develop a high quality UHV facility so that Colgate can introduce training in these important techniques and experience with materials science problems into their upper level laboratory program. They intend to incorporate a carefully supervised training module into the experimental methods course, provide experimental exercises to support the Solid State Physics course, and use the system as a major station in the advanced laboratory program. In addition, there is a wide range of research problems in materials and surface science that are manageable for talented undergraduates to accomplish as independent projects. The basis for the project is a UHV system with a stainless steel test chamber that can be configured to accept a variety of experiments. Additional features to be incorporated are: (1) an ion sputter gun to get surfaces atomically clean, (2) a residual gas analyzer to support the training program in UHV techniques, and to do experiments in desorption of gasses from surfaces, (3) a means to prepare high quality thin films by evaporation, and (4) a reflection high energy electron diffraction system to investigate the structure of prepared films in situ, and make possible electron diffraction experiments.