(NU/0954) The Supply and Installation of a Time-of-Flight-Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry Instrument

Descriptions

Newcastle University hosts the EPSRC Mid Range Facility in X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy. We have received funding under the EPSRC ‘Great Eight Technologies’ capital funding programme to extend this capability to ion beam methods, and as part of this the University intends to invest in a state-of-the-art instrument for Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry (SIMS).The University has strong research portfolio across the range of scientific disciplines, but is particularly strong in life sciences, medical applications and bioengineering. Our Great Eight Capital Proposal emphasised strongly the advantages of being able to apply SIMS to materials that form part of this work. SIMS spectra are complex, and we have limited experience and staff resources to devote to identifying the molecular identity of large mass peaks. Therefore we need MS/MS capability to assist us in identifying these high mass peaks. We have done considerable work on gas cluster ion beams in x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), from which it is clear that the higher energy clusters are significantly more rapid, with emerging literature evidence that water clusters can offer a higher ionisation yield in many cases, plus there is evidence from the recent literature that higher argon cluster energies lead to higher ionisation yields of large fragments. Therefore we need a high energy analytical primary ion source and the ability to produce primary water clusters.