Formerly called the Chemistry Facility

Facility Director

seshadri [at] mrl [dot] ucsb [dot] edu (Professor Ram Seshadri)

Facility Manager

amanda [at] mrl [dot] ucsb [dot] edu (Amanda Strom)

The MRL TEMPO Laboratory has advanced instrumentation for the characterization of materials and chemical samples. We offer an extremely wide range of instrumentation for Thermal, Electronic/Elemental, Magnetic, Porosity, and Optical measurements.

This instrumentation is available to users from UCSB, other Universities, and Industry.

Training is available. We are now offering a testing service.

We have instrumentation for measuring the:

Thermal Properties of Samples

• TGA/TGA-MS
• DSC
• High Temp XRD
• PPMS

Electronic & Magnetic Properties of Samples

• PPMS
• DynaCool PPMS
• SQUID
• TGA

Elemental, Phase, & Evolved Gas Composition of Samples

• ICP
• XRD
• MS Accessory for TGA

Optical Properties of Samples

• UV-Vis-NIR Spectrometer
• Fluorimeter
• Olympus BX41 Fluorescence Microscope

Porosity, Surface Area, & Density of Samples

• TriStar BET Porosimeter
• Pycnometer

All instruments are available for responsible users to test their own samples. Training is offered quarterly for the more complex instruments and users may self train on the other instruments any time. There are specific insurance and liability requirements for off-campus facility users. They are described at this link: Non-UCSB Use of MRL Facilities

All people working in the TEMPO lab are required to follow good practice and to have already attended the UCSB EH&S Laboratory Safety Training.

Contact amanda [at] mrl [dot] ucsb [dot] edu (Amanda Strom) or 805-893-7925 for more information.

The High-Field NMR Facility at the University of Massachusetts Amherst is an interdepartmental facility, open to researchers of the Five Colleges Consortium (UMass Amherst, Smith, Mt. Holyoke, Amherst and Hampshire Colleges) and surrounding industries. It supports research programs of twenty groups in the areas of chemical synthesis, polymer chemistry, materials science, and natural products. The facility oversees five NMR spectrometers. Two of them (DPX300 and Avance400) are public-access spectrometers for the research needs of 200 users and the teaching needs of graduate and undergraduate students from all science and engineering majors. Three additional spectrometers are available for advanced applications. The Avance600 spectrometer is equipped with a cryoprobe and capable of triple resonance and gradient experiments, while the DSX300 and Infinity300 are wide bore solid-state spectrometers which are equipped for triple resonance, high-speed magic angle spinning, and wideline experiments. The spectrometers are Ethernet-linked to a number of Silicon Graphics and Windows computers for data analysis, computation, and manipulation of three-dimensional structures.

The IBD Nanobiology Facility is a joint venture between the Biological and Physical Sciences Divisions. This facility was created in the Institute for Biophysical Dynamics (IBD) to establish a wide range of core capabilities in advanced microscopy, time-resolved fluorescence, AFM imaging, and single molecule mechanics. It is directed by Prof. Norbert Scherer (Chemistry) with Justin Jureller, Ph.D. as Technical Director. It has two parallel missions: to develop new instrumentation and methods building on emerging nanoscale biological techniques; and to provide general user access, training, and support for commercial instrumentation in the aforementioned areas. Often times this will result in the construction of custom optomechanical instruments for specialized user projects. Current instrumentation includes two biological atomic force microscopes (Aslyum MFP-3D and Bruker Multimode), time-resolved and steady-state fluorimeters (ISS ChronosBH and HJY Fluorolog-3), ultrafast laser sources, custom TCSPC (Becker-Hickl) microscopes, and a variety of optics and optomechanical resources. Currently in development are a new Simultaneous Multiplane 3D Imaging Microscope based on a programmable spatial light modulator, a novel ultrafast amplified laser source intended for nonlinear imaging of nanoparticles, colloids, intracellular granule transport, and a DMD programmable mirror based LED system for optogenetics experiments. The facility has a teaching/training component that is being utilized in lab courses for the Graduate Program in Biophysics. The NanoBiology Facility maintains strong educational and industrial outreach programs as well as consulting services for projects, grant writing, and publications.

The Quantum Transport Laboratory (QTL) maintains a Quantum Design Physical Property Measurement System (PPMS) for characterization of electrical, thermal, transport, and magnetic properties of materials down to cryogenic temperatures. The PPMS provides precise and continuous temperature control from 1.9K to 400K and is equipped with a 9-Tesla superconducting magnet for work at high magnetic fields. Installed accessories include DC resistivity, high vacuum (

In addition to the PPMS, the QTL provides technical consulting and instructs students in cryogenic techniques.

The mission of the University of Minnesota Department of Chemistry Mass Spectrometry Laboratory is to bring state-of-the-art mass spectrometry expertise, methodology, and instrumentation to the research and clinical infrastructure of the University of Minnesota. Dr. Joseph Dalluge joined the University of Minnesota in 2009 to direct and expand an existing MS facility. The Mass Spectrometry Laboratory currently occupies about 2,000 square feet of laboratory space on the 1st floor of Kolthoff Hall as part of the Leclaire-Dow Chemical Instrumentation Facility that also includes the X-Ray Crystallography Laboratory and the NMR Laboratory. Support for the facility comes from service fees charged to investigators and direct institutional support from the University of Minnesota. In addition to the mass spectrometry core services provided, the Mass Spectrometry Laboratory has established close research collaborations with a number of departments within the University, including Chemistry, Biological Sciences, and Medicine, and is part of the Center for Bioanalysis of Molecular Signaling.

The Hill Hall 302 Chemical Vapor Deposition lab is equipped to safely use pyrophoric gases (silane, for example) to grow amorphous or nanocrystalline silicon films and silicon nanocrystal powders by plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition. The lab is also shared with the Advanced Coatings and Surface Engineering Laboratory (ACSEL)

The Rheometry Facility was established to characterize the stress/strain relationships and other rheological properties of complex fluids. It maintains an Anton Paar MCR 301 rheometer with fully automated measurement capabilities in both stress- and shear-rate-controlled modes. Tools for parallel plate, cone, and Couette measurement geometries are available with temperature-stabilized sample stages and solvent trap. The system also can apply electric fields (up to 5 kV) and magnetic fields (up to 1 T) to characterize electro-and magneto-rheological fluids.

The Materials Research Center (MRC) cleanroom facility is devoted to materials processing, growth, device fabrication, characterization and electronic & photonic materials. The MRC cleanroom complex in Cook Hall provides microfabrication and thin film processingcapabilities. Facility includes class 100 and 1000 cleanrooms. The facility provides microfabrication tools for general use by the Northwestern community, government and industrial researchers. Various techniques are available for the growth, preparation and processing of a wide range of thin film materials including in-process characterization. Training of equipment and assisted use within the MPMF is available to provide the necessary expertise.

This provides a centralized resource for the deposition of metal, semiconductor & dielectric thin films, photolithography, and processing. Standard microfabrication processes have been established. Available techniques include plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition, e-beam evaporation, atomic layer deposition, reactive ion etching, photolithography, bonding, rapid thermal processing, Hall Effect Measurement and some characterization instrumentation.

Shared facility operated by the Nebraska Center for Materials and Nanoscience (NCMN). The function of the Electron Nanoscopy Instrumentation Facility is to provide hands-on access to electron microscopes, sample preparation equipment plus data collection and data reduction instrumentation, along with advice, training and research collaboration. The scope of the facility is materials characterization of the topography, morphology, elemental composition, crystalline microstructure, crystal defects, and atomic arrangements of materials, largely on a scale from 10 micrometers down to the near-atomic level.

This new facility consists of an SEM (FEI XL-30) for electron-beam lithography, a probe station (Cascade 12000) for electrical characterization, and three scanned-probe microscopes (SPMs) for in situ electrical measurement of devices concurrent with electrostatic force and scanned-gate microscopy. One SPM (DI-Dimension 5000) is configured for electrically contacting samples, and another SPM (JEOL-4210) has controlled environment (ambient to high vacuum, 120-800K) and electrical feedthrus for in situ electrical measurements. This facility is operated cooperatively with the Department of Physics.