Acquisition of Small-Angle X-Ray Scattering under Shear for Materials Research and Education

这笔拨款为购置小角度x射线散射设备提供支持，用于宾夕法尼亚州立大学的材料研究和教育。小角x射线散射（SAXS）是在2 ~ 100 nm尺度上探测材料结构最有力的分析工具之一。这个规模体系包含了宾夕法尼亚州立大学各种各样的研究。新仪器将使复杂流体（如液晶）的基本结构-性质关系的新研究令人兴奋，其中剪切的应用扰乱了缺陷纹理的形态，这反过来又决定了流变性。这类材料对显示、光学数据存储和成像非常重要。众所周知，剪切流动在相边界附近也会引起相变化，并导致明显不同的最终形态。例子包括聚合物共混物中的流动诱导相分离和流动诱导结晶。SAXS是研究这些效应的理想手段。SAXS还将用于生物材料的纳米级相分离、纳米多孔固体中流体的固化和分子自组装等正在进行的研究。此次收购将填补宾夕法尼亚州立大学材料研究的关键分析空白。我们期望校园SAXS的可用性将教育学生和教师x射线散射技术。该仪器将加强所有用户的现有研究计划，并实现新的研究和合作，部分原因是将对教师研究很重要的原位流体剪切细胞纳入其中。这种新的SAXS仪器将为研究生和本科生创造学习机会。材料科学与工程系将开设SAXS实验课程。该仪器将成为宾夕法尼亚州立大学全校材料研究所分析实验室的一部分，使其可供200多个研究小组和700名研究生使用。

This grant provides support for the acquisition of small-angle X-Ray scattering equipment to be used for materials research and education at Pennsylvania State University. Small angle X-ray scattering (SAXS) is one of the most powerful analytical tools for probing the structure of materials on 2-100 nm length scales. This size regime encompasses a diverse spectrum of research at Pennsylvania State University. The new instrument will enable exciting new studies of fundamental structure-property relationships of complex fluids such as liquid crystals, where the application of shear perturbs the morphology of the defect texture, which in turn dictates the rheology. This class of materials is important for displays, optical data storage and imaging. Shear flow is also known to induce phase changes near phase boundaries and result in markedly different final morphologies. Examples include flow-induced phase separation in polymer blends and flow-induced crystallization. SAXS is the ideal means to study these effects. SAXS will also be used in ongoing research on nano-scale phase separation in biomaterials, solidification of fluids in nanoporous solids and molecular self-assembly. This acquisition will fill a critical analytical void in materials research at Pennsylvania State University. We expect that the availability of on-campus SAXS will educate students and faculty in the techniques of X-ray scattering. The instrument will strengthen existing research programs of all users and enable new research and collaborations, in part by the incorporation of an in situ fluid shear cell important to faculty research. This new SAXS instrument will create learning opportunities for graduate and undergraduate students. A SAXS laboratory course will be developed in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering. The instrument will become part of Penn State's campus-wide Materials Research Institute analytical lab, making it available to more than 200 research groups and 700 graduate students.