Laboratory Overview

The Particle Size and Characterization Lab at the Department of Geology and Geophysics is a facility dedicated to measuring the size distributions of materials from 1 nanometer (nm) up to 2 millimeters (mm).

In addition to size, the instrumentation available is capable of specialized analyzes from which the size of a particle is used. These specialized analyzes include electrophoretic mobility, zeta(ζ) potential, particle surface charge, distributed shape analysis and others.

We use DLS (dynamic light scattering), SLS (static light scattering), laser dispersion and high speed image analysis to perform these analyses.

And we don't only do nano-particles! The equipment in this lab is capable of measuring the size distribution of soils, powdered rocks, ash, coffee and even mechanically separated meat! Please feel free to ask if you have something in which you need the size to be characterized!