Acquisition of an Aberration Corrected Analytical Electron Microscope for Nanocharacterization of Materials

这笔拨款支持获得一台像差校正分析电子显微镜（AEM），用于里海大学纳米尺度材料的表征。定位和同时识别晶体材料中原子性质的能力是参与材料表征的研究人员的目标之一。由于最近球差（Cs）校正器的成功商业开发，这一目标现在可以在分析电子显微镜（AEM）中实现。Cs校正器允许将电子探针尺寸细化到原子水平，同时增加探针中的电流量，从而提高在Cs校正的AEM中产生和检测到的所有信号的质量。计算和最近的实验证实，c校正器将提高所有目前的性能指标2-10倍，从而创造一个真正独特的仪器。利哈伊仪器将补充其他使用cs校正仪器的国家和国际项目，这些仪器强调高分辨率成像和原位实验，而不是分析技术。在新仪器上进行的研究将为纳米级界面偏析的本质提供新的见解，这种偏析控制着材料的脆性破坏，增强了陶瓷的机械性能，微电子设备的行为以及在钢上产生被动氧化层。加强亚纳米催化剂颗粒在氧化亚氮还原、一氧化碳氧化为二氧化碳和地下水环境修复中的化学性质的研究。即使是光束敏感的聚合物也可以在AEM中进行x射线测绘，而cs校正器将允许对含离子聚合物的微观结构和纳米级化学进行定量测量。里海大学的电子显微镜实验室，尤其是AEM已经成为来自各行各业和大学的研究人员的研究中心。利哈伊大学还通过一年一度的显微镜学院，为来自工业和政府研究实验室的数千名研究人员、技术人员和工程师提供了显微镜教育和培训中心。cs校正的AEM将是唯一的cs校正仪器，可用于如此广泛的教学和培训，并将整合到正在进行的AEM和纳米结构表征课程中。cs校正仪器的研究成果将通过一门名为“纳米技术材料”的新课程，融入里海大学研究生和大四本科生的学习体验中。其他大学的学生和研究人员也可以通过互动的多机构学习计划，通过实时视频/音频/互联网连接，向宾夕法尼亚大学、卡内基梅隆大学、德雷塞尔大学、匹兹堡大学和宾夕法尼亚州立大学的研究生提供这门课程。其他学校也表示有兴趣通过互联网2视频会议参与这一项目，其中包括佛罗里达农工大学、霍华德大学、草原景观农工大学、萨凡纳州立大学和南方大学等几所代表性不足的大学。

This grant supports the acquisition of an aberration corrected Analytical Electron Microscope (AEM) for the characterization of materials at the nanometer scale at Lehigh University. The ability to locate and simultaneously identify the nature of the atoms in crystalline materials is one goal of researchers involved in the characterization of materials. This goal is now achievable in the Analytical Electron Microscope (AEM) because of the recent successful commercial development of spherical aberration (Cs) correctors. A Cs-corrector permits the refinement of the electron probe dimensions to the atomic level while increasing the amount of current in the probe, thus increasing the quality of all the signals generated and detected in the Cs corrected AEM. Calculations and recent experiments confirm that the Cs corrector will improve all present performance metrics by 2-10 times, thus creating a truly unique instrument. The Lehigh instrument will complement other national and international projects employing Cs-corrected instruments that emphasize high-resolution imaging and in-situ experiments rather than analytical techniques. The research performed on the new instrument will offer new insights into the nature of nanometer-level interfacial segregation that controls the brittle failure of materials, the enhancement of mechanical properties in ceramics, the behavior of microelectronic devices and the creation of passive oxide layers on steels. The elucidation of the chemistry of sub-nanometer catalyst particles used for nitrous oxide reduction, oxidation of carbon monoxide to carbon dioxide, and environmental remediation of groundwater will be enhanced. Even beam sensitive polymers have proven amenable to X-ray mapping in the AEM, and the Cs-corrector will permit quantitative measurements of the microstructure and nano-scale chemistry of ion containing polymers. Lehigh's electron microscope laboratory and the AEM in particular already act as a center for researchers from a wide range of industries and universities. Lehigh also serves as a center for microscopy education and training, for thousands of researchers, technicians and engineers from industrial and governmental research labs, through its annual Microscopy School. The Cs-corrected AEM will be the only Cs-corrected instrument available for such broad-based instruction and training and will be integrated into ongoing courses on AEM and Characterization of Nanostructures. The research enabled by the Cs-corrected instrument will be infused into the learning experience of graduate and senior undergraduate students at Lehigh via a new course, 'Materials for Nanotechnology.' This course is also available to students and researchers at other universities, via an interactive, multi-institutional learning initiative accessible via real-time video/audio/internet connections to graduate students in similarly equipped classrooms at the University of Pennsylvania, Carnegie-Mellon University, Drexel University, the University of Pittsburgh and Penn State University. Other schools have expressed interest in participating in this program via Internet2 video-conferencing, including several universities strong in under-represented groups such as Florida A&M, Howard, Prairie View A&M, Savannah State and Southern University.