Vision & Mission

Our Vision

The ACMM’s vision is to be a world-leading facility for modern microscopy and microanalysis, offering premier instruments, services and training to researchers from across Sydney and around Australia, and providing strong leadership in the national and international characterisation communities. This vision incorporates our aspiration to be a leading international centre of microscopy-oriented research with globally recognised academic endeavours that contribute to the research strengths of the University of Sydney.

Our Mission

To provide leadership in microscopy and microanalysis that supports innovation in Australian science and engineering through research services, research programs and research training.

The centre staff are motivated towards sharing expertise and the development of techniques for understanding the relationships between the structure and function of materials, devices and living systems. There are three core performance areas of the ACMM: to (i) provide research services, (ii) undertake leading edge research programs and (iii) deliver internationally recognised research training programs.

Research Services

The centre delivers characterisation services to the research community through the provision of state-of-the-art expertise and instrumentation in a wide range of microscopy and analysis techniques. These services are provided across a variety of modern facilities that exploit the optics from collimated beams including those of electrons, X-rays, ions, light and lasers as well as scanned probe techniques for surface science. Researchers from the University of Sydney are the major users of the centre, but usage from other nodes of the AMMRF, other University and Government-based laboratories and industry is also very significant.

Our staff has a wide range of scientific backgrounds, enabling the provision of expertise across a range of scientific, technological and engineering disciplines. Academic staff collaborate closely with users and researchers throughout the University’s three colleges, and the work of the ACMM has a strong academic component. Staff provide academic and technical guidance to users on their projects and are expected to provide leadership in the development, introduction and application of characterisation techniques.

Research Programs

The centre's academic staff maintain their own substantial programs, supported by competitive funding from both research councils, agencies and the community, particularly industry. They supervise research students and publish research outcomes of quality and quantity consistent with international benchmarks. One of the most important agencies of our research programs is postgraduate studentships and postdoctoral fellowships. The academic aspects of the student candidature etc. are embedded in the University’s Faculty of Science and this provides an outstanding mechanism for enrolment and management of PhD candidatures supervised by academic staff of the ACMM.

Research Training

In addition to PhD research studentships and postdoctoral fellowships, the centre offers research training through its internationally renown graduate coursework program in microscopy and microanalysis; specialised undergraduate coursework modules for the University’s BSc and BE degree programs; targeted fee-for-service training programs for the community, in particular industry; and special workshops and conferences. The graduate coursework program offers awards at the Graduate Certificate, Graduate Diploma and Master of Applied Science level. The individual coursework modules are available to users of the centre, to expedite their independent, competent and confident mastery of the facility consistent with the needs of their research.