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LUXOR’s highly advanced metal coaters (Au/Pt) are extensively used for many applications within the field of materials science – such as pharma, life science, electronics, polymers, ceramics, as well as for academic purposes.
Materials science
Materials science comprises many different branches and covers a wide range of materials like polymers, filters, metals, pharma, textiles, coatings, ceramics, life science applications, electronics, and so on.
The LUXORAu and LUXORPt metal coaters are widely used for all of these applications, particularly for electron microscopy (SEM and FEG-SEM) purposes where sample charging might be an issue and when working with beam sensitive materials.
What is sample charging?
SEM images are produced by scanning a finely focused electron beam across the sample and interacting with the atoms on the sample surface. The interaction products (the most important are backscattered electrons, secondary electrons and X-rays) are measured by the corresponding detectors with high spatial resolution and used for image generation. Electron beam scanning permanently adds electrons to the sample. Sample charging occurs when the sample is a poor conductor, which means there is little or no conducting path for the electrons to flow from the sample surface towards the sample holder or microscope. This creates a high negative potential, which disturbs the sensitive detectors and leads to a massive brightening of the scan field. In extreme cases, the primary electrons cannot reach the sample surface and are repelled and diverted directly to the detector. The SEM image or the EDX X-ray analysis is then unusable. As a result sample charging causes all kinds of problems such as drift, blur, and low contrast. In other words, blurry and false images.
The list of materials science applications ranges from particle characterization, analysis of the micromechanics of composites, visualizing the morphology of plastics, root cause analysis of different materials etc.
Todays’ materials science labs have become a central hub for product development, solving customer issues and high level quality control applications. Despite a wide diversity of incoming materials and their related issues, reproducible and user friendly testing methods have to be readily available and accessible to operators who only have a limited knowledge of the equipment. Moreover speedy and high throughput solutions are crucial to cope with the everyday work.
This is why the LUXOR fully automated metal coater fits perfectly in your lab.
In the LUXOR knowledge center you will find application notes and technical guides that are of interest for a wide range of industrial and academic environments
Academic applications
Working properly with a SEM or FEG-SEM microscope demands – amongst other things – for extensive knowledge about sample preparation.
To this end, the leading scientists of tomorrow learn how to work with LUXOR coaters in universities all over the world.
The LUXORAu and LUXORPt metal coaters can cope with a wide diversity of sample materials and are therefore particularly suitable for academic applications.
In a university setting, many different operators, ranging from students to senior researchers are using SEM technology and related sample preparation techniques such as sputter coating on a daily basis. There is also the wide diversity of specimens and materials for which a reliable sample preparation technique is essential.
Thanks to the fully automated operation and the optimised user interface of the LUXOR coater, the chance of human errors is minimal.
In the LUXOR knowledge center you will find application notes and technical guides that are of interest for a wide range of industrial and academic environments
