Electron Paramagnetic Resonance Instrument for Materials Characterization

这笔赠款的目的是为拉瓦尔大学化学系的三名研究人员(一名职业早期研究人员和两名成熟的研究人员)提供电子顺磁共振(EPR)仪器，参与有机材料的合成和表征。目前迫切需要这种仪器，因为化学系甚至校园里都没有EPR设施。样品需要送往全国各地进行分析，这对大多数人来说是不可能的，因为含有自由基的分子不稳定。为了产生高质量的结果，学生和博士后必须携带他们的样本，在现场进行样本准备和分析。这种情况极大地阻碍了许多项目的进展，并造成了不必要的时间和金钱损失。EPR不仅是一种获得奇特结果的优雅方法，而且对于PI来说也是必要的，因为它允许表征作为两个PI实验室各种项目的核心的分子。这些分子包括具有开壳(双自由基)特征或带有形式自由基的共轭低聚物和聚合物、纳米管和石墨烯纳米带。这一EPR系统将支持30多名科学家(学生、PDF和研究助理)参与的尖端和创新的研究计划，这些科学家涉及包括材料、有机化学和无机化学在内的各个化学领域。该仪器将提供给化学系的所有其他研究生和博士后(150名研究人员)。拥有这一仪器对HQP的培训和他们未来在材料相关领域的职业生涯也非常重要。

The purpose of this grant is to provide three researchers (one early-career researcher and two established researchers) of the Department of Chemistry at Université Laval involved in the synthesis and characterization of organic materials with an Electron paramagnetic Resonance (EPR) instrument. There is an immediate need to obtain this instrument since there is no EPR facility in the Department of Chemistry or even on the campus. The samples need to be sent across the country for analysis, which is impossible for most of the them because of the instability of the radical-containing molecules. To generate high-quality results, students and postdocs have to travel with their samples, make the sample preparation on-site and do the analysis. This situation impedes the progression of many projects tremendously and results in unnecessary time and money loss. The EPR is not just an elegant method to get fancy results, but is necessary for the PIs since it allows the characterization of molecules that are the centerpieces of various projects in both PIs' lab. These molecules include conjugated oligomers and polymers, nanographenes, and graphene nanoribbons having an open--shell (diradical) character or bearing a formal radical. This EPR system will support the state--of--the--art and innovative research programs of more than 30 scientists (students, PDFs and research associates) involved in various areas of chemistry, including materials, organic and inorganic chemistry. This instrument will be made available to all others graduate students and postdocs of the Department of Chemistry (150 researchers). Having this instrument is also very important for the training of HQP and for their future career in materials--related areas.