Ling Group Laboratory

We have a comprehensive set of facilities for materials synthesis and characterisation, including a controlled-atmosphere microwave furnace and an IR floating-zone image furnace for the synthesis of cm-scale single crystals of high melting-point (up to 2200 ºC) oxides, nitrides and intermetallics.

We operate two X-ray powder diffractometers with in situcapabilities (80 ≤ T ≤ 2100 K under controlled atmospheres), two Quantum Designs Physical Properties Measurement Systems with a full set of probes (thermal measurements, magnetometry, electro-transport, dilatometry) with a furnace and a dilution insert capable of reaching milli-Kelvin temperatures and a high-precision impedance spectrometer for ionic conductivity measurements.

The School of Chemistry also has single crystal X-ray, vibrational spectroscopy, NMR, electron microscopy and high-performance computing facilities of which we make regular use.

Our lab houses a complete facility for lithium-ion battery research, built around a 4-port glovebox and includes all equipment necessary for materials synthesis, coin/pouch cell construction, post-synthesis modification and electrochemical cycling. In 2017 we acquired Australia’s only transmission electron microscopy liquid electrochemistry cell, for in operando studies of batteries and other functional materials systems. 

At ANSTO we have access to a wide range of physical property characterisation facilities in the Institute for Materials Engineering. Most importantly, we make extensive use of the neutron scattering facilities at the OPAL research reactor, notably: the single-crystal quasi-Laue diffractometer Koala; the powder diffractometers Wombat and Echidna; and the inelastic scattering instruments Taipan, Sika and Pelican.

The ready availability of these world class facilities in Sydney, along with the X-ray scattering facilities at the Australian Synchrotron in Melbourne, allows us to pursue almost any problem in modern materials science.

Where necessary we travel to overseas neutron and synchrotron facilities to use more specialised instruments. We make regular trips (usually several times a year) to the ILL in France, ISIS in the UK, and the APS in the USA.