This Major Research Instrumentation (MRI) grant will enable the acquisition of a three-ion-beam microscope, the ORION NanoFab system, from Carl Zeiss Microscopy. This tri-beam system can provide unprecedented resolution, precision and versatility for the fabrication and characterization of materials and devices all the way down to the nanometer scale (roughly a few times the atomic spacing). The ORION NanoFab system is expected to make a significant impact on interdisciplinary nanoscience research, particularly in the areas of quantum matter and technology, medical and bio-engineering, photonic and optoelectronic research, meta-materials, and renewable energy science. The tri-beam system will be located at the Kavli Nanoscience Institute (KNI) of the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), which provides laboratories with state-of-the-art infrastructure and houses centralized nanofabrication and nano-characterization facilities for researchers at Caltech, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), and corporations and other institutes in the greater area of Southern California. As this form of tri-beam microscopy is only in its infancy, Caltech will also be partnering with Zeiss in a technical outreach effort to bring experts together to advance new ideas and applications of the tri-beam tool. This collaborative outreach plan includes: hosting annual workshops at Caltech with industrial and global research-community users of the ORION NanoFab to exchange information on research highlights, technical challenges, and new technical developments and applications. As part of outreach effort there is also a plan to offer nanoscience "demo days" for K-12 students in which the advanced instrumentation of the ORION NanoFab and other tools in the KNI can be used to explore the nanoscopic world, as well as lectures and lab tours at Caltech to local high school students and teachers on topics of nano-science and technology (nano-S&T) and applications of modern microscopy.
This Major Research Instrumentation (MRI) grant will enable the acquisition of a three-ion-beam microscope, the ORION NanoFab system, from Carl Zeiss Microscopy. The ORION NanoFab is a three-ion-beam nano fabrication and microscopy system capable of an imaging resolution of 0.5 nm and a cutting resolution of ≲2nm, virtually independent of material. The system is designed to seamlessly switch between gallium, neon and helium beams, so that one has the option of employing the gallium focused ion beam (FIB) to pattern materials at the micro-scale, taking advantage of the powerful yet gentle neon beam for precision nano-machining with speed, or using the helium beam to fabricate delicate sub-10 nm structures that demand extremely high machining fidelity and/or cutting of delicate materials (such as graphene) that are prone to damage by high-energy electrons or heavy-element ion beams. Its capability of maskless nano-patterning also minimizes possible contamination due to the multiple steps required in processing and removing masks. The ORION NanoFab system is expected to make a significant impact on interdisciplinary nanoscience research, particularly in the areas of quantum matter and technology, medical and bio-engineering, photonic and optoelectronic research, meta-materials, and renewable energy science. The tri-beam system will be located at the Kavli Nanoscience Institute (KNI) of the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), which provides laboratories with state-of-the-art infrastructure and houses centralized nanofabrication and nano-characterization facilities for researchers at Caltech, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), and corporations and other institutes in the greater area of Southern California. In partnership with Zeiss we also plan to bring together the industrial and global research-communities in a series of annual workshops at Caltech designed to help advance the technology and applications of multi-beam microscopy and nanofabrication.
