This award will support the operation of a high-pressure research facility housed and operated by the Department of Earth and Space Sciences at the State University of New York in Stony Brook. The facility consists of two large, multi-anvil, presses capable of sustained sample pressures in the range 0-30 GPa (0- 300 kilobars) and temperatures up to 2500K. One of these presses is capable of being transported and interfaced with the National Synchrotron Light Source at nearby Brookhaven Laboratory. The facility will be engaged in high-pressure experiments directed by the Stony Brook team and also by an outside users community of geoscientists interested in high-pressure research. The equipment is uniquely suited for the synthesis and characterization of geophysically important phases found at depth in the Earth's interior.
