Applications for Material Science and Nanomaterials
IMSERC has a large pool of modern instrumentation for (nano)materials scientists and chemists. Our center is integrated with the Chemistry Department at Northwestern University where scientists run their experiments on a 24/7 basis. From monitoring reactions to full structure elucidation, researchers and students have access to a variate of techniques that can be used for:
Crystallographic atomic structure determination, identification, and refinement of organic and inorganic compounds for extraction of structural information such as:
Determination of unit cell and bonding environment (bond-lengths, bond-angles, cation-anion coordination, site-ordering, etc.)
Determination of packing of molecules and co-crystals
Determination of extended structure and packing of building blocks
Determination of (non)centrosymmetric or chiral topologies
Refinement of modulated and twinned structures (incommensurate, commensurate, composite superstructures)
High resolution data for charge density measurement and precise assignment of atoms with similar chemical environment
Powder evaluation of sample purity (sensitivity of ~2% by weight)
Quantitative determination of individual crystalline phases and impurities in mixtures of powder
Monitor reactions in real time as a function of time, temperature, pressure, and gas flow/pressure
Probe catalytic changes to substrates
Investigate decomposition mechanism
Construction of phase diagrams
Rocking curve measurements for evaluation of defect density and quality of crystals
Texture measurements and orientation of grains in a polycrystalline sample
Strain analysis
In-situ monitoring of crystallization processes with increasing temperature
Crystallographic atomic structure determination of nanomaterials, nanoparticles and amorphous materials
Particle size of crystalline phase
Total scattering techniques in combination with synchrotron and/or neutron radiation
Modeling and atomic structure determination of nanoparticles and glasses
Decomposition temperature using ThermoGravimetric analysis which can be coupled with GC-MS for the identification of the decomposition products
Temperature of combustion with ThermoGravimetric analysis and identification of combustion volatiles using GC-MS
Liquid chromatography (LC), gas chromatography (GC), and general mass spectrometry (MS) analysis materials analysis such as:
Chemically test/detect material surfaces for organic comppounds using matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization (MALDI) mass spectrometry
Determine chemical modifications of material surfaces
Perform generic materials analysis, such as extractables and leachables analysis, residual manufacturing material, as well as migration analysis
Image material surfaces for chemical composition analysis via MALDI mass spectrometry
Mass spectrometry imaging is performed using MALDI in IMSERC. In these experiments, the sample of interest is placed on a conductive glass slide (ITO slide) and sprayed with matrix to facilitate ionization upon irradiation with a laser. The image is generated by monitoring the ion intensities measured by the mass spectrometer as created by the raster scanning of the laser that is essentially creating the pixels. Spatial resolution can routinely go down to 20 um and can be specially tuned to reach almost 5 um.
Nuclear Magnetic Resonance
Variable temperature (VT) NMR
Diffusion ordered spectroscopy with NMR (DOSY)
Quantitative NMR and Purity
T1/T2 Relaxation
Ligand binding sites and affinities (Kd)
Heteronuclear NMR
Polymers, porosity, and polymorphism
Solid state NMR to characterize/determine the structure of insoluble compounds, synthetic polymers, and other materials
Thermal analysis which can be coupled with GC-MS for the determination of:
Melting point using either Differential Thermal Analysis or Differential Scanning Calorimetry
Crystallization transition using either Differential Thermal Analysis or Differential Scanning Calorimetry
Glass transition using Differential Scanning Calorimetry
Decomposition temperature using ThermoGravimetric analysis which can be coupled with GC-MS for the identification of the decomposition products
Temperature of combustion with ThermoGravimetric analysis and identification of combustion volatiles using GC-MS
In-situ monitoring of solid-state reactions using Differential Thermal Analysis
Qualitative and Quantitative elemental analyses
Halide determination (Chlorine, Bromine, Iodine) in solids or liquids using X-ray Fluorescence Spectroscopy
Survey of impurities and elements heavier than Sodium with X-ray Fluorescence Spectroscopy
Optical spectroscopy
Determination of functional groups and likely solvent molecules using Infrared (IR) spectroscopy
Vibrational stretches using Raman and IR Spesctroscopy
Color, band gap, and absorption measurements using Ultra-violet (UV), visible (Vis), and IR spectroscopies
Photoluminescence, lifetime phosphorescence, and emission measurements using spectrofluorimeter