High Energy Powder X-ray Diffraction for Advanced Materials Characterisation

先进的功能材料在我们的日常生活中得到了应用，从手机电池到燃料电池，二氧化碳捕获材料和计算机硬盘驱动器。作为化学家，我们的任务之一就是了解原子在这些高级功能材料中的排列方式。一旦获得了这种理解，我们就可以将其与这些材料的性能联系起来，这些材料最终将在我们的日常生活中找到它们的方式。用于研究这些材料的一项关键技术被称为粉末x射线衍射。粉末x射线衍射是一种用于以下几个原因的技术：测定我们在实验室制作的样品的纯度；为了非常详细地了解这些材料中的原子是如何排列的，并了解原子排列在不同条件下是如何变化的，比如高温和流动的气体。这一提议将使我们能够购买一台新的粉末x射线衍射仪，配备最先进的反应室和单独的样品转换器。这将使可变温度实验（高达1800k）在一系列不同的气体气氛下进行。该设施将在苏格兰和英国国家同步加速器设施之外是独一无二的。高能x射线的使用将使我们能够研究比目前在圣安德鲁斯更广泛的样品（通过研究吸收样品和荧光样品），并且购买毛细管样品转换器将使样品的吞吐量更高，显着提高我们的研究效率和生产力。粉末x射线衍射广泛应用于物理科学，为圣安德鲁斯大学化学学院的100多名用户提供直接支持。该设施将支持三名早期职业研究人员和大量博士生（通过CRITICAT和EaSICAT博士培训计划）和博士后研究人员的研究，此外还有学院内三分之一以上的知名学者。我们的愿景是，这台设备将成为我们发展可持续的世界级设施的重要补充，使全球绝大多数实验室无法实现的科学成为可能。它将提供一个独特的核心科学设施，可供所有研究人员使用，以尽可能提高科学质量。将开展的工作将集中在各种具有基础科学兴趣的材料以及在电池，燃料电池，计算机硬盘驱动器和气体分离/存储中的应用。

Advanced functional materials find applications in our everyday lives, from batteries found in mobile phones, to fuel cells, materials for CO2 capture and computer hard disk drives. One of our roles as chemists is to understand how atoms are arranged in these advanced functional materials. Once this understanding is gained, we can link it to the performance of these materials which will ultimately find their way into our everyday lives. One key technique used to study these materials is called powder X-ray diffraction. Powder X-ray diffraction is a technique used for several reasons: to determine the purity of samples we make in the laboratory; to get an extremely detailed understanding of how atoms are arranged in these materials and to understand how atomic arrangements change when subjected to different conditions, such as elevated temperatures and flowing gases. This proposal will enable the purchase of a new powder X-ray diffractometer, with a state-of-the-art reaction chamber and a separate sample changer. This will enable variable temperature experiments (up to 1800 K) to be carried out under a range of different gas atmospheres. This facility will be unique in Scotland and in the UK outside the national synchrotron facility. The use of high energy X-rays will enable the study of a wider range of samples than currently possible in St Andrews (by enabling the study of absorbing samples and samples that fluoresce) and the purchase of a capillary sample changer will enable a higher throughput of samples, markedly improving our research efficiency and productivity. Powder X-ray diffraction is widely used in physical sciences, supporting over 100 users directly in the School of Chemistry at the University of St Andrews. This facility will support the research of three early career researchers and a large number of PhD students (through the CRITICAT and EaSICAT doctoral training programmes) and post-doctoral researchers, in addition to over a third of the established academics within the School.The vision is that this piece of equipment will be an important addition in our goal to develop sustainable world-class facilities that enable science which is not possible in the vast majority of laboratories around the globe. It will provide a unique core science facility that can be accessed by all researchers to enhance the quality of science possible. The work that will be carried out will focus on a variety of materials of fundamental scientific interest as well as applications in batteries, fuel cells, computer hard drives and gas separation/storage.