The University of Sheffield
Department of Materials Science and Engineering

Experimental Facilities

The department has outstanding facilities for materials research to its disposal. These include materials production facilities like wet chemical processing for ceramics and polymers; powder processing for ceramics; glass melting; casting; extrusion and rolling for metals; rapid solidification and water atomisation for nanoscale metallic materials, and extensive facilities for deposition of coatings.

Our excellent materials properties characterisation facilities include Field Emission Gun Transmission Electron Microscope (FEGTEM), High Resolution Electron Microscope (HREM), Field Emission Gun Scanning Electron Microscope (FEGSEM), Focus Ion Beam (FIB) and Electron Probe Micro-Analysis (EPMA).

Outstanding X-ray facilities comprise high-resolution x-ray diffraction using a STOE facility, high temperature XRD, low angle transmission XRD and a texture goniometer. Surface analysis techniques include state-of-the-art XPS and SIMS.

We have laboratories for cell and tissue culture, flow assisted fluorescence cell sorting, conformal microscopy and liquid chromatography.

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Sorby Centre for Electron Microscopy and Microanalysis

The centre applies advanced transmission and scanning electron microscopy to investigate the microstructure and chemistry of materials. The Sorby Centre is pleased to under take microanalysis for external customers to any standard required allowing complete structural and microstructural characterisation of materials from the micro to the nanoscale.  Visit the website.

X-Ray Diffraction Laboratory (XRD)

One of the UK´s leading laboratory-based diffraction facilities, specializes in characterization of a wide array of solid state materials, including electroceramics, cements, refractories, metals and glasses. Visit the website.

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TMC

Thermomechanical Compression Machine (TMC)

The machine - the most advanced machine of its type - was built and designed to simulate metal forming processes. It is also available for external contract work, and it has been used to develop processing windows for many different industries. Read more.

Arbitrary Strain Path Machine (ASP II)

IMMPETUS has developed the Arbitrary Strain Path (ASP II), which is capable of subjecting metals and alloys to complicated strain path histories under industrial hot working conditions. Read more.

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