Materials Science
Materials Science is an interdisciplinary field that mixes engineering with physics and chemistry to design and produce new materials.
Materials scientists emphasize understanding how a material influences its structure, and thus the material's properties and performance. This includes nanotechnology, biomaterials, and metallurgy. Materials science is also an important part of forensic engineering and failure analysis - investigating materials, products, structures or components which fail or do not function as intended, causing personal injury or damage to property. Such investigations are key to understanding, for example, the causes of various aviation accidents and incidents.
Equipment
UV-Vis-Near IR spectroscopy with stopped flow
The Shimadzu UV-2600 spectrophotometer allows absorption/transmission and reflection spectroscopic measurement of solutions and solids throughout the ultraviolet and visible light ranges (185-900 nm). Its integrating sphere additionally allows measurements into the near infrared region (<1400 nm). The study of reaction kinetics is facilitated by the spectrometer’s fast scan speed and a dedicated TgK Scientific rapid mixing assembly.
Far-mid-near FTIR spectroscopy
The Shimadzu IR-tracer 100 Fourier transform infrared spectrometer provides high sensitivity measurements of infrared spectra from in the far- mid- and near-infrared regions (12500-240cm-1 / 800-42000 nm). An ATR stage and range of sample holders allow for the study of solutions, oils, powders and thin films.
HPLC
The Agilent 1220 Infinity LC System provides high-quality Ultra High-Performance Liquid Chromatography capabilities. Its high-pressure pump allows small particle size column packing for separation of complex mixtures of organic species. It is equipped with an autosampler and UV-detector allowing for rapid routine analysis of reaction by-products.
TGA-DTA MS
The Hitachi STA 7200 Simultaneous Thermal analyser allows thermogravimetric measurements and differential thermal analysis to be carried out at the same time on organic/polymeric compounds and inorganic ceramics and metals. Very small mass changes can be measured (0.2 µg), up to temperatures of 1100ºC. Through coupling to a HIDEN HPR-20 QIC evolved gas analyser, the off-gases produced during decomposition of the compounds can be rapidly identified and quantified using mass spectrometry.
More information
For more information on what we do, you can visit our dedicated Materials Science website.