Instrument development by our students:

 

UHV preparation chamber

J. Nitz, X. Chen, G. Rojas, N. Spaulding, C. Bravo

Our low temperature STM was purchased from Omicron, but we decided to build the UHV preparation chamber by ourselves (the chamber on the right in both images). We used SolidWorks to make all technical drawings. The preparation chamber is equipped with several metal e-beam evaporators, an evaporator for organic materials, other standard surface science tools, and a sample manipulator for sample and STM-tip preparation.

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Molecule evaporator

G. Rojas

We have developed and built a tool for the preparation of molecular nanostructures under ultrahigh vacuum. Our molecule evaporator consists of 4 separate crucibles and thermocouples inside a water-cooled housing and thus permits the deposition of up to 4 kinds of molecules at the same time. The temperature of the crucibles can be controlled separately, also computer-controlled, with a precision and stability of less than 0.1 Kelvin.

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STM tip preparation station

J. Nitz, G. Rojas

We use this tip preparation station to anneal STM tips up to 2300 K by electron bombardement under ultrahigh vacuum. During this procedure the tips are cleaned, oxides or other contaminations will be removed. The tips are loaded into this station with a wobble stick.

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table-top STM for classrooms and teaching

J. Nitz

This scanning tunneling microscope is designed for use in classrooms and for student training. It operates under ambient conditions and room temperature, and can give atomic resolution on certain samples. It was designed to be as cheap and simple as possible.