GEOLOGICAL SCIENCES AT BROWN UNIVERSITY
Labs for Geochemistry/Mineralogy/Petrology

The geochemistry laboratories are well equipped for the application of chemical and particularly isotopic techniques to the solution of geologic problems. Equipment includes: automated mass spectrometers capable of analyzing both light and heavy elements, including O, C, Rb-Sr, Sm-Nd and U-Th-Pb, and all the necessary chemical and vacuum equipment to support mass spectrometer operations; a clean laboratory for the preparation of samples for isotopic analysis, including bombs and abraders for U-Pb zircon, monazite and sphene analyses; pressure vessels for experimental research, capable of operating continuously up to 1200°C and 3000 bars pressure; modern petrographic and binocular microscopes with conventional and digital photographic attachments; the usual ancillary gear used in mineral separation and sample preparation.
The thermal ionization mass spectrometer is an automated Finnigan-MAT 261 multicollector with 6 Faraday cups and an axial secondary electron multiplier (SEM), permitting simultaneous SEM/Faraday analysis of radiogenic Pb. There is also ready access to a Cameca electron microprobe and an XRF spectrometer for major and minor element analysis, both housed in the Department, and Cameca IMS-3f and Cameca 1270 ion microprobe microanalyzers housed at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.

The facilities used by the experimental petrology/volcanology group include two experimental laboratories with numerous hydrothermal pressure vessels (Cold seal Rene and TZM), a 14 kb internally heated pressure vessel, two piston cylinder vessels, and sample preparation equipment. Analytical facilities include a CAMECA SX-100 electron microprobe, an XRF spectrometer for analysis of major and trace elements. There is a new FTIR spectrometer in the Department, and researchers here have ready access to the Cameca 3f ion probe and a new generation Cameca 1270 ion probe at Woods Hole.