MRI: Acquisition of Rocky Mountain Environmental X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy Facility for In Situ Characterization of Active Surfaces

该合同将为环境x射线光电子能谱仪（E-XPS）的采购提供资金，以建立一个独特的区域设施，用于探索操作和/或反应环境中材料表面的行为，并为科罗拉多矿业学院（CSM）和落基山脉地区的合作机构提供高级测量培训。对于许多对我国能源和环境未来至关重要的功能材料，其性能取决于设备运行期间材料的表面特性，而在标准高真空表面分析工具通常测量的条件下，材料的表面特性可能会有很大差异。因此，该奖项建立的E-XPS用户设施将为各种材料依赖技术和科学领域提供新的见解。该E-XPS中心将为落基山脉地区的工程、化学、地球物理和其他学科的新用户和感兴趣的用户提供极大的扩展，使用E-XPS来研究活跃环境中的材料和表面。该仪器将作为一个自给自足的用户设施安装和建立在CSM，以提高该区域内部和外部用户的XPS能力。建立的设施将为CSM和其他地方的下一代科学和工程领导者提供世界一流的材料科学研究和教育经验。该设施将提高学生在仪器、仪器性能、样品制备和数据分析方面的知识，这些知识与他们在本科和研究生课程和研究活动中各自的研究领域有关。异构接口在许多工程过程和自然系统中起着关键作用。活性表面介导多相化学反应，经常引发材料或器件的断裂或失效，并且对局部环境非常敏感。由于活性条件下的表面性质可能与体性质有很大差异，因此许多研究人员无法在设备运行或相关环境条件下研究界面化学状态，这对基础科学见解构成了重大障碍。E-XPS将为材料和设备在真实和操作环境中的表面和近表面状态提供宝贵的非破坏性评估，从而克服传统的实验室XPS在特高压条件下的局限性。根据该合同建立的E-XPS用户设备将允许在压力高达25毫巴、温度高达800°C的条件下测量固体-蒸气和固体-液体-蒸气界面，并可以在非平衡表面的电化学扰动下工作。这些能力可以在现实的化学、电化学和热环境中进行表面表征，用于与能量转换、化学处理、地球化学和材料降解相关的过程。该装置可以在单一频谱中测量横向或深度剖面，并且可以在标准XPS（即特高压）条件下工作，从而满足CSM的关键需求。E-XPS最近才从大量超额认购的基于同步加速器的用户设备扩展到实验室规模的仪器。因此，该用户设施将大大提高E-XPS能力的访问和吞吐量，使CSM以及合作地区大学和联邦研究实验室能够进行开创性和协作性的跨学科材料研究。来自众多工程学科、物理科学和地质科学的预期用户将使用E-XPS仪器来解决诸如能量转换技术、地球化学、环境过程和材料制造等领域中关于材料表面行为的突出问题。进一步预计，这些在活跃环境中独特测量的技术影响将吸引这些领域的工业用户。

CBET - 1626619Decaluwe, StevenThis award will fund acquisition of an Environmental X-ray Photoelectron Spectrometer (E-XPS) to establish a unique regional facility for exploring behavior of material surfaces in operating and/or reactive environments and for training in advanced measurements at theColorado School of Mines (CSM) and collaborating institutions across the Rocky Mountain region. For many functional materials critical to our nation's energy and environmental future, performance depends on material surface properties during device operation, which can vary quite significantly from surface properties under conditions typically measured by standard high vacuum surface analysis tools. For this reason, the E-XPS user facility established by this award will enable new insights into in a diverse array of material-dependent technologies and scientific fields. This E-XPS center will significantly expand access for new and interested users across the Rocky Mountain Region in engineering, chemistry, geophysics, and other disciplines to employ E-XPS to study materials and surfaces in active environments. The instrument will be installed and established as a self-sustaining user facility at CSM to advance XPS capabilities in the region for both internal and external users. The established facility will provide world-class material science research and education experiences for the next generation of science and engineering leaders from CSM and elsewhere. The facility will advance students' knowledge of instrumentation, instrument capabilities, sample preparation, and data analysis relevant to their respective fields of study in undergraduate and graduate coursework and research activities.Heterogeneous interfaces play a critical role in many engineered processes and natural systems. Active surfaces mediate multi-phase chemical reactions, often instigate fracture or failure in materials or devices, and are very sensitive to local environments. Because surface properties under active conditions can deviate significantly from bulk properties, the inability for many researchers to study interfacial chemical states during device operation or in relevant ambient conditions presents a substantial barrier to fundamental scientific insight. The E-XPS will provide invaluable non-destructive evaluation of surface and near-surface states for materials and devices in real and operating environments, thereby overcoming the limitations of conventional, lab-based XPS at UHV conditions.The E-XPS user facility established by this award will allow measurements of solid-vapor and solid-liquid-vapor interfaces at pressures up to 25 mbar, temperatures up to 800°C, and can operate with electrochemical perturbation of non-equilibrated surfaces. These capabilities enable surface characterization in realistic chemical, electrochemical, and thermal environments for processes related to energy conversion, chemical processing, geochemistry, and materials degradation. The unit can measure lateral or depth profiles in a single spectrum, and can operate under standard XPS (i.e. UHV) conditions, thereby meeting a critical need at CSM.E-XPS has only recently expanded from heavily oversubscribed synchrotron-based user facilities to laboratory-scale instruments. This user facility will therefore greatly improve access and throughput for E-XPS capabilities, enabling groundbreaking and collaborative interdisciplinary materials research at CSM and at collaborating regional universities and federal research labs. Expected users from numerous engineering disciplines, physical sciences, and geological sciences will employ the E-XPS instrument to address outstanding questions about material surface behavior in arenas such as energy conversion technologies, geochemistry, environmental processes, and materials fabrication. It is further anticipated that technological implications of these unique measurements in active environments will draw in industrial users in these fields.