Recipient organisationScience and Technology Facilities Council
Funding£1.5M
PeriodJul 2006 — Jul 2010
In plain English
AI plain-English summary
A particle accelerator at Daresbury Laboratory fires beams of medium-energy ions at solid surfaces to reveal the atomic-scale composition and structure of materials, layer by layer. This matters because the properties of many advanced materials—from catalysts to computer chips—are determined by what happens in the first few atomic layers at their surfaces or at buried interfaces between different materials. Existing techniques struggle to see this region with sufficient depth resolution. The MEIS facility is the only one of its kind in the UK, and without continued funding for staff, consumables, and equipment, it would cease to operate, closing off a unique analytical capability. If the facility remains operational, UK scientists can study how bimetallic catalysts segregate at the surface, how magnetic layers in hard drives behave, and how silicon processing affects device performance. The research spans both fundamental model systems and real-world materials. Because the facility is open to all academic users, new applications—such as in spintronics or quantum dot devices—are likely to emerge during the funding period. Much of this work underpins technologies that quietly keep modern electronics, data storage, and corrosion-resistant materials functioning.
View original technical description
This proposal seeks the resources to ensure effective operation of the unique UK Medium Energy Ion Scattering (MEIS) facility for the next 4 years. As such, it aims to exploit the considerable assets both in equipment (replacement value ~ 3M) and expertise that exist at the Daresbury Laboratory near Warrington. Funding is needed to provide manpower, consumables and eqipment to ensure the facility runs efficiently and continues to create the potential for new experiments in research areas not previously explored. MEIS is a technique which provides compositional and structural information with a depth resolution approaching that of a single atomic layer. Probing ions scatter from atoms in the target in elastic billiard ball like collisions losing energy to the recoiling atoms. Energy analysis of the scattered ion enables the elemental identity of the atom to be established, while additional smaller energy losses due to inelastic electronic excitations allow the determination of the depth of the target atom below the surface. High-energy resolution ensures atomic-scale depth sensitivity. The elastic scattering also gives rise to 'shadowing' of one atom by another on the incident and outgoing trajectories, and the resulting variations of scattered yield with scattering angle provide layer-specific structural data. Consequently, MEIS provides unique compositional and structural information on the surface and sub-surface properties of solids and ultra-thin films. The outstanding capabilities of the MEIS instrument at Daresbury, coupled with its unique status as a user facility, offer UK scientists the ability to study a range of surface and near surface phenomena in fundamental and applied science, much of which underpins key technological areas as diverse as:- Catalysts, where research is envisaged to study the role segregation in the effectiveness of bimetallic catalysts and also the possibility of making catalysts capable of producing chirally pure products.- Magnetic multilayer materials like those found in modern data storage devices such as hard disc drives- Silicon processing techniques for advanced devices such as computer processors and memory chips (including growth, implantation and metallisation)- Corrosion protection for architectural, aerospace and automotive applications along with more specialised products such as medical implants - Novel semiconductor materials that could be used in future generations of electronic goods (spintronic devices and quantum dots) The user programme comprises both fundamental studies of model systems and technological studies of 'real-world' materials. Since the facility is open to all academic users, new applications in novel areas can be expected to emerge during the funding period.
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