Acquisition of a gas chromatograph-mass spectrometer system at Department of Earth, Environmental and Planetary Sciences, Brown University

该合同将为地球、环境和行星科学部提供一种新的气相色谱-质谱仪（GCMS），用于挥发性和半挥发性有机化合物的灵敏分析。它取代了已有19年历史的GCMS。该仪器对于多个pi的研究至关重要，这些pi拥有NSF项目的良好资助历史，用于培训研究生和博士后，本科生以及访问科学家。所有四个pi都有正在进行的研究项目，需要使用GCMS来鉴定和定量从地质和环境样品中提取的有机分子。pi和研究生也积极参与更广泛的影响活动，例如在当地的GK-12学校教学，这些学校有不同的代表性不足的人口。该仪器将用于鉴定和量化一系列重要的地质生物标志物，包括烯酮、甾醇、多环芳烃、长链烷基二醇等。沉积物岩心中的这些生物标志物为过去的温度变化、人类活动、自然火灾和生物生产力提供了重要的见解。现有的GCMS仪器落后于最先进的三代，灵敏度大幅下降，维护成本增加，严重影响了学生和博士后的培训和研究。新的GCMS将克服这些问题，并大大加强研究和培训活动。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This award will provide a new gas chromatograph-mass spectrometer (GCMS) instrument for sensitive analysis of volatile and semi-volatile organic compounds at the Department of Earth, Environmental and Planetary sciences. It replaces a nineteen year old existing GCMS. This instrument is crucial for research by multiple PIs with a history of well-funded NSF projects, for training graduate students and postdocs, undergraduate students, as well as visiting scientists. All four PIs have ongoing research projects that require use of GCMS for identification and quantification of organic molecules extracted from geological and environmental samples. PIs and graduate students also actively participate in broader impact activities such as teaching at local GK-12 schools with diverse under-represented populations. The instrument to be purchased will be used to identify and quantify a wide range of important geological biomarkers including alkenones, sterols, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, long chain alkyl-diols etc. These biomarkers in sediment cores provide critical insights to past temperature changes, human activities, natural fires and biological productivity. The existing GCMS instrument is three generations behind the state-of-the-art and has suffered from major decline in sensitivity and increasing maintenance costs, which has significantly affected training and research of students and postdocs. The new GCMS will overcome these problems and greatly enhance the research and training activities.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.