This proposal requests matching funds to purchase a Field Emission Scanning Electron Microscope (FESEM) for the a multi-use facility at the University of Connecticut Storrs Campus. The proposed instrumentation will replace an existing 16 year old FESEM which is heavily used, but is now out of date and increasingly difficult to maintain. The instrument will be available to investigators within and outside of the main campus of the University of Connecticut. Over the past five years 83 individuals have used the existing FESEM. The requested instrument will ensure continued availability of high resolution scanning electron microscopy for research and training at this institution. It will also introduce useful capabilities not available on the existing instrument. In particular, variable scan rates and high resolution low voltage operation will permit high magnification imagine of radiation sensitive material and uncoated samples difficult or impossible to study in the existing instrument. Other improvements such as high vacuum gun design, digital control electronics, and capabilities for digital image acquisition and replay, will greatly facilitate operation and maintenance, increase throughput for users and reduce photographic costs. This instrument will be used to carry out planned or ongoing projects of six major users. These include investigations of phylogenetic relationships of parasitic worms, the role of development in evolution and ecology of plants, cell death during neurogenesis, effects of heat shock on renal function, effects of land use on plankton biodiversity in lakes, larval and pupal morphology in insect development. It is expected, based on previous experience at this facility, that the requested instrument will also be heavily used by many additional projects in years to come.
