This facility features cutting-edge instrumentation, techniques and expertise required for exceptionally high-resolution imaging and analytical characterization of a broad array of materials.
NCEM was established in 1983 to maintain a forefront research center for electron-optical characterization of materials with state-of-the-art instrumentation and expertise. The NCEM facility has 2 double-aberration corrected microscopes for atomic resolution imaging (the TEAM 0.5 and TEAM I microscopes) resulting from the Transmission Electron Aberration-corrected Microscope (TEAM) project, a multi-laboratory development project from 2003 – 2009 which aimed to integrate the latest advancements in electron optics, detectors, sample stages, and computational techniques into a suite of instruments freely available to the worldwide scientific community. Having merged with the Molecular Foundry in 2014, the NCEM facility continues to conduct fundamental research relating microstructural and microchemical characteristics to materials properties and processing parameters; develops advanced electron microscopy techniques, computer algorithms and instrumentation; and helps educate future scientists in the theory and application of electron optical microcharacterization.
NCEM’s focus and major impact is in the following areas of research:
- Defects and deformation
- Mechanisms and kinetics of phase transformations in materials
- Nanostructured materials
- Surfaces, interfaces and thin films
- Microelectronics materials and devices
