Materials Microcharacterization Collaboratory

The Center for Microanalysis of Materials (CMM) is one of the four electron microscopy and microcharacterization user facilities participating in the Materials Microcharacterization Collaboratory (MMC) supported by the DOE-SC, Office of Basic Energy Science, and DOE Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy Program, Office of Transportation Technology. The MMC unites the four DOE BES electron microscopy user facilities at ANL, LBNL, ORNL, and the CMM at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Also participating in the MMC are the DOE EE microcharacterization user center at ORNL and the NAMT program at NIST. MMC also has several industrial partners. The purpose of the MMC is to bring the microanalytical and microcharacterization tools and expertise at these centers of excellence and other participating facilities together in an on-line interactive collaboratory and make them available to educators and researchers working in industry, universities, and government laboratories through telepresence access and operation. The MMC, however, is about remote collaboration, not just remote instrument control. The approach of the MMC also emphasizes providing the tools for establishing a sense of community and performing research using the MMC. The CMM has several instruments and peripherals available on-line emphasizing a Web-centric approach with varying levels of access and functionality. This program has developed and implemented hardware and software tools for remote and collaborative operation