An advanced 3D atom probe analysis facility

新材料越来越多地依赖于非常精细的化学效应，有时是原子水平。要了解这些材料是如何工作的，它们在使用过程中是如何退化的，以及我们如何改进它们，需要了解它们是如何以这种规模组合在一起的。牛津大学首次开发的三维原子探测器(3DAP)是观察材料微观结构的唯一方法，在三维中逐个原子。通过这种方式，3DAP可以被认为是为科学家提供了材料的分子生物学，从而帮助他们了解材料是如何工作的。该项目旨在极大地改进现有的3DAP分析设施，从而为英国科学家提供原子级别的材料分析的先进能力。该项目开发的仪器将允许在比以前短得多的时间内分析更多的材料，从而可以看到更多的材料微结构，还可以研究半导体材料和器件。一旦新仪器被开发出来，它将被用于研究一些具有重要技术意义的材料科学问题，例如核动力潜艇反应堆压力容器所用钢材中铜团的形成。正在为计算机硬盘中的下一代读取头开发的多层材料也将被研究，以更好地了解这些层的结构和化学控制其性能的方式。通过将原子尺度上的实验和建模联系起来，该项目将为新材料和纳米技术设备的设计和开发提供更好的工具。

New materials increasingly rely on chemical effects at a very fine scale, sometimes at the atomic level. Understanding how these materials work, how they degrade in service and how we can improve them requires knowledge of how they are put together at this scale. The three-dimensional atom probe (3DAP), first developed at Oxford University, is the only way of seeing the microstructure of materials, atom-by-atom in 3-dimensions. In this way, the 3DAP can be thought of as giving scientists the molecular biology of materials and so helping them understand how materials work. This project aims to greatly improve the existing 3DAP analysis facilities and so provide advanced capabilities for materials analysis at the atomic-scale for scientists in the UK. The instrumentation developed in the project will allow larger volumes of material to be analysed in much shorter times than previously, so that more of the material microstructure can be seen, and also allow semiconductor materials and devices to be studied. Once the new instrumentation is developed, it will be used to study a number of technologically important materials science problems, such as the formation of copper clusters in steels used for the pressure vessels in the reactors on nuclear-powered submarines. The multilayer materials which are being developed for the next generation of read heads in computer hard disks will also be investigated, in order to understand better the way that the structure and the chemistry of these layers control their properties. By linking experiments and modelling at the atomic scale, this project will produce better tools for the design and development of new materials and nanotechnology devices.