Worldwide network of in-situ TEM/ion accelerator facilities

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The focus of this proposal is to establish a formal, worldwide network of in-situ TEM/ion accelerator facilities (TEMIAFs) in order to attempt to use this small but important global resource in a much more effective manner than hitherto. The novel focus of the proposal is that the intention is to form a network involving the early-stage researchers associated with each facility rather than the senior staff. There are 8 such (known) facilities worldwide. The initial establishment of the network will be via visits by the Salford PI and PDRA to the other TEMIAFs to make contact with the early-stage researchers and to gather information regrading the capabilities of each facility. Note that the PI is involved in the visits in order to facilitate the initial contacts partially through his own contacts with senior TEMIAF staff.These facilities enable specimens of a variety of materials to be irradiated with energetic ions whilst simultaneously imaging in a transmission electron microscope. This approach can give remarkable insights into fundamental aspects of radiation damage in that dynamic processes are observed and recorded as they occur. In-situ studies also offer a very significant efficiency gain in that one hour of video-recorded irradiation experiment may be equivalent, literally, to weeks of ex-situ experiments in which specimens are transferred repeatedly between implanter and microscope. Such studies also make it possible to carry out experiments in which specimens are irradiated and analysed by TEM at temperatures other than room temperature. This is generally difficult or impossible where ion irradiation and microscopy take place sequentially. Studies of this type make important contributions to areas such as radiation damage in nuclear reactor materials (fission and fusion), semiconductor processing and surface engineering (using ion beams or plasmas). In the nuclear materials area, experiments on these facilities provide important data for researchers carrying out theoretical modelling studies.Currently, the individual facilities (which employ a variety of types of microscope and implanter) are operated entirely independently -- undoubtedly sometimes resulting in a mismatch between the characteristics of the facility and those required by a particular experiment. This proposal seeks to set up a network of early-stage resaerchers and a central website in order to optimise (globally) the use of such facilities and to seek further opportunities for funding to enable mobility of researchers amongst the member laboratories and explore the possibility of setting up a virtual collaboratory that would permit real-time collaborative experiments using the internet.