FEI will be here next week to do routine maintenance on the Titan.
Expect Monday through Thursday.
The S-TEM will be serviced next week (Monday – Thursday) so unavailable for use. Please plan accordingly.
Blue Marble Security, born out of the Michigan Tech Enterprise program, is a virtual company comprised of American and international undergraduate students focused on securing the future through thoughtful use of technology.
The project Paul Sanders proposed to Glen Archer was straightforward enough — make something old new again. Sanders came upon the challenge through a former colleague at Ford Motor Company, James Boileau.
The company’s goal was to replace the CRT monitors with off-the-shelf LED displays, similar to what you would find in most office computers.
The students were given access to Tech’s JEOL 6400. In addition, Owen Mills, senior research engineer and director of the Applied Chemical and Morphological Analysis Laboratory in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, provided printed schematics, operations and maintenance manuals. The search for a place to tap the video signals required the visual inspection and search of hundreds of pages of printed schematics. Finally Blue Marble found what they were looking for — a low-voltage signal in an early video display protocol pioneered by IBM called monochrome display adapter (MDA).
We are beginning something new with AFM training. We have used up all the cantilevers that came with the AFM so we have no more to use in training. We will charge for the cost of a cantilever to be used in training. Now, the AFM training cost is $21 for a cantilever plus $12/hr labor. We will need an account index for these charges before work can begin.
Let me know if you have questions.
I’m happy to say that the TEM is back online. You can schedule time when you need it.
We are seeing some horizontal lines in the images above magnification 100KX. I’m in touch with the Hitachi engineers who have given me a test. We will do that test this afternoon and get more info from Hitachi.
The scope works fine below 100KX so I’m not closing off use.
I’ll be in touch with you regarding progress.
The Bhakta Rath Research Award honors a graduate student and faculty mentor for in-depth work with social impact. The 2019 winners are two biomedical engineers with a sticky past.
A smart adhesive doesn’t adhere all the time. In 2015, when Ameya Narkar started his doctoral research with Bruce Lee, associate professor of biomedical engineering at Michigan Technological University, the two turned to biological sources for a glue that could be turned on and off.
Q: How have your methods helped make the project successful?
Ameya Narkar: Our biomedical engineering department is full of approachable experts. It’s a small team and an effective one. I could walk down to a faculty member’s office and ask for advice when our project branched into areas beyond our lab’s expertise. Plus, I was able to work closely with the people in the Applied Chemical and Morphological Analysis Laboratory and the microfabrication facility. Collaboration is essential to successful research.
The 6400 and JEOL TEM are still down.
TEM
Our engineer is sending me a circuit board to try in the TEM. If we are lucky that is all it is we will be back online.
6400
There is a power supply problem that I am working on. Not an easy fix.
So repairs to both instruments are on going.
The 2010 TEM is still down with a vacuum pump problem. I’m working with our service engineer to get it back online.
I’ll keep you up to date.
The 6400 is back online and ready to use. I don’t have a lot of faith that this was a permanent fix since this has happened several times. Get your work done now!