Facilities

Electron Microscope Facilities

MCEM supports four transmission electron microscopes, three scanning electron microscopes and a dual beam focussed ion beam (FIB) microscope, as well as a broad range of instrumentation for sample preparation and data analysis.

These microscopes are housed in an award-winning building designed to provide exceptional mechanical, thermal and electro-magnetic stability to optimise instrument performance. This is one of the most stable such buildings worldwide.

Transmission electron microscopes

Scanning electron microscopes/Dual beam focused ion beam (FIB) microscope

  • In-situ SEM

    Procurement Underway - Installation 2023

  • Correlative Analytical SEM

    Procurement Underway - Installation 2023

Specimen preparation equipment

  • Allied Techprep polisher
  • Atom probe tip polisher (in-house)
  • Branson Sonifier 450
  • Buehler EcoMet 3000 Grinder-polisher
  • Buehler Handimet 2 Roll Grinder, two units
  • Buehler IsoMet Low Speed Saw
  • Buehler Vibromet 2 Vibratory Polisher
  • Cressington 208 HR Sputter Coater
  • Cressington 208 Evaporative Carbon Coater
  • Fischione Instruments Model 1070 Nanoclean
  • Gatan 601 Ultrasonic Disc Cutter
  • Gatan 656 Dimple Grinder, two units
  • Gatan 682 Precision Etching and Coating System (PECS) and Perpendicular Slope Cutting Tool
  • Gatan 691 Precision Ion Polishing System (PIPS)
  • Gatan 695 Precision Ion Polishing System II (PIPS II)
  • Gatan 950 Solarus Advanced Plasma System
  • LatticeGear FlipScribe
  • Leica EM ACE600 Coater (Carbon thread and metal sputter coater)
  • Leica EM UMC7 Cryo-ultramicrotome
  • Leica M165C Stereo Optical Microscope with digital camera
  • Mbraun Glovebox Unilab Pro
  • NAPCO Model S831 Vacuum Oven
  • Nikon Eclipse Ni Optical Microscope
  • Olympus BX-51 Stereo Optical Microscope with digital camera
  • Olympus SZX-16 Stereo Optical Microscope with digital camera
  • Reichert Ultracut S and FCS Cryo-ultramicrotome
  • SEM Drying Oven
  • Struers Accutom 100 Precision Saw
  • Struers Citovac Vacuum Impregnation Unit
  • Struers Lavamin Specimen Cleaning Unit
  • Struers Lectropol 5 Electrolytic Polisher
  • Struers Tegramin-30 Automated Polisher
  • Struers Tenupol 2, 3 and 5 Twin Jet Electrolytic Polishers
  • Thermo Scientific Vacutherm Vacuum Oven
  • Wire Saw
  • XEI Evactron Softclean Zephyr Plasma Cleaner

Click here for a full list of staff responsibilities for specific equipment.

Software

SoftwareComputer platform

Amira v5, several copies

PC

Bruker Esprit V2.1 EDS X-ray analysis software (on SEMs and TEMs and multiple off-line copies)

PC

Latest versions of CrystalMaker, SingleCrystal, CrystalDiffract (Available for download from Monash Software Centre)

Mac and PC

EDAX TEAM software V8/TSL OIM EBSD Suite (on microscope and off-line)

PC

FEI TEM Imaging & Analysis software (TIA)

PC

FIJI/Image J

PC

Gatan Digital Micrograph V1 and V2 (on microscopes and multiple off-line copies)

PC

HKL Channel 5 EBSD Suite (on microscope and off-line)

PC

HREM software for Gatan DigitalMicrograph: SmartAlign with Template Matching; Multivariate Statistical Analysis (MSA); FFT-Multislice Simulation Suite; Geometric Phase Analysis (GPA); Image Processing Utility (IPU) plug-in

PC

ICSD crystal database provided by FIZ Karlsruhe, several licences

Online

IDL, multiple licences

PC

Image and diffraction pattern simulation programs based on Multislice and Bloch wave methods (public domain and in-house)

PC

JEMS for simulation of diffraction patterns and images, multiple copies

PC

Mathematica (Available for download from Monash Software Centre)

PC

Matlab (Available for download from Monash Software Centre)

PC

Monte Carlo simulation of electron trajectories and X-ray production (Casino, WinXray and in-house)

PC

muSTEM electron scattering simulation suite, multiple copies

PC

Oxford AZtec V5 EDS and EBSD analysis software (on microscope and multi-seat network licence)

PC

PDF4 ICDD Crystal Database (available in the Monash X-ray Platform)

PC

TeamViewer

PC and Mac

VASP (Vienna ab-initio simulation program) licence

Linux

WEIN2K

Fortran 90 compiler

* In-house software for elastic and inelastic electron scattering calculations for the interpretation of CBED, STEM, Phase Contrast images, EELS and EDX based on Multislice and Bloch Wave algorithms.