University of York - EPSRC capital award for core equipment 2022/23

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

The University of York proposes to purchase the following items of core capital equipment through this strategic investment:An inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometer (ICP-OES). This equipment will add research capability to the University and support collaborative research across the Department of Chemistry, School of Physics, Engineering and Technology and Department of Biology. This instrument will provide critical quantitative elemental composition information of solutions, molecules and materials at part per billion concentrations and above. This will support a number of multi-disciplinary collaborative projects including interrogating metal complexes and materials used in chemical synthesis, catalysis, metal waste recycling including batteries, and metal nanoparticle magnetism, diagnostics and therapeutics. The high sensitivity of ICP-OES also supports work to characterise and understand systems requiring trace metal analysis including metallomics.A domed hot stage (Anton Paar DHS 1100) for x-ray diffraction (XRD) and reflectivity (XRR) studies. The requested hot stage will allow in-situ heating of samples up to 1100oC whilst simultaneously measuring XRD and XRR. This in-situ thermal observation capability will provide additional unique information such as temperature-dependent phase transformations, thermal changes of structural parameters, unveil reaction kinetics, intermediate phases, or high-temperature phases that decompose at lower temperatures, all of which are highly relevant in industrial processes. It will be used across the School of Physics, Engineering and Technology and our Department of Chemistry in projects including analysis of magnetic tunnel junctions within commercial spintronic and magnetic devices and analysis of materials for solar cells.A multi-parameter circular dichroism spectrophotometer. Not only will this equipment add much needed dedicated capacity for our engineering and physical sciences (EPS) researchers, but it will also have enhanced capability specific to EPS experimental requirements such as an extended wavelength detection range (160-1600 nm) to study energy-efficient processes that are only revealed at longer wavelengths. This instrument will support researchers across Organic, Inorganic, Physical and Molecular Materials groups in our Department of Chemistry, the School of Physics, Engineering and Technology, the Centre for Energy Efficient Materials and the York-JEOL Nanocentre with projects in areas such as liquid crystals, helical semiconductors, self-healing 3D printable gels and 'shape-shifting' polymers.