Australian Centre for Neutron Scattering

Wombat is a high intensity neutron diffractometer that  is primarily used as a high-speed powder diffractometer, but has also expanded into texture characterisation and single-crystal measurement, particularly diffuse scattering.  

Neutron powder diffraction is particularly useful for materials with light elements in the presence of heavy ones and for magnetic materials such as superconductors, pharmaceuticals, aerospace alloys and much more.

Koala is one of the leading small-molecule crystallography instruments in the world for determining the complex crystal structure of a wide range of chemicals and minerals.

Kowari, a residual stress diffractometer, can be used for ‘strain scanning’ of large engineering components as large as 1000 kilograms.

The Platypus instrument can be used to study all-manner of surface-science and interface problems, particularly related to magnetic recording materials and for polymer coatings, biosensors and artificial biological membranes.

The QUOKKA instrument provides the powerful technique of small-angle neutron scattering which can look at sizes and structures of objects on the nanoscale including soft matter.

Taipan is used to study the collective motion of atoms, phonons and magnons in materials, and phase transitions and processes involving thermal energy.

Ultra small angle neutron scattering on Kookaburra is used to study the size and shape of objects of size 10 micrometres and below.

The instrument is designed to measure inelastic neutron scattering, or do neutron spectroscopy.

The instrument is ideally suited to study of spin and lattice dynamics, magnon and phonon dispersion relations in single crystal samples.

Neutron imaging or tomography creates a whole series of three-dimensional images of an object that can be reconstructed.

The instrument is very well suited for the study of kinetic effects, like relaxation following a chemical reaction, or external impulses like mechanical deformation, an electric or magnetic field.

Theinstrument is typically used to study diffusing water molecules or yet larger molecules like polymers or biological molecules. In addition, Emu can reveal quantum-mechanical tunnelling.

A Laue-diffraction neutron alignment camera for single crystals.

A neutron reflectometer for vertical samples.

The Food Materials Science project applies nuclear-based techniques to investigate fundamental and industrial problems of national significance in food science, including food processing and product development. ingredient selection, food, and health

Creating a global energy system that is both environmentally and economically sustainable is unquestionably one of the largest challenges facing the scientific and engineering communities.

Over the last decades, neutron, photon, and ion beams have been established as an innovative and attractive investigative approach to characterise cultural-heritage materials.