New XRD at RSES - First of its kind in Australia

4 December 2018

A new X-ray diffractometer ‘Empyrean S3’ arrived this week, replacing three older instruments and expanding the capabilities of our XRD lab. The instrument is the first of its kind in Australia.

Apart from analysing standard powders, small samples and those in capillaries, we can now perform micro-XRD of small areas without interference of the surrounding matrix, using a high-brilliance beam of 50 µm+ diameter. The programmable xyz-stage permits setting up a sequence of analysis points or mapping of flat samples, with good intensity provided. Up to 45 powder samples can be loaded at once and analysed with the automatic sample changer (i.e., we can now run overnight if you are in a hurry), while individual hand-specimens weighing up to 2 kg may be loaded on a multipurpose stage. The slurry cell attachment allows the observation of crystal growth in solutions. We expect to be up and running in January. Come and see Ulli Troitzsch to get your samples lined up! 

The equipment was supported by Co-investigators Penny King, Jochen Brocks and Rachel Wood at RSES, Larissa Schneider (Culture, History and Language) and Adrian Sheppard (Physics and Engineering). We are grateful for additional contributions from others in the School (Eggins, Troitzsch, Opdyke) , RSPE (Tan, Herring), CHL (Haberle), RSC (Liu), RSEng (Lipinski) the Australian Federal Police, UNSW-Canberra (Liow, Kayali), and Uni Canberra (McQueen, Hoogewerff, Moore, White).