Sample preparation equipment

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Sample preparation equipment refers to equipment used for the preparation of physical specimens for subsequent microscopy or related disciplines - including failure analysis and quality control. The equipment includes the following types of machinery:

Microscopy technical field of using microscopes to view samples and objects that cannot be seen with the unaided eye

Microscopy is the technical field of using microscopes to view objects and areas of objects that cannot be seen with the naked eye. There are three well-known branches of microscopy: optical, electron, and scanning probe microscopy, along with the emerging field of X-ray microscopy.

Failure analysis is the process of collecting and analyzing data to determine the cause of a failure, often with the goal of determining corrective actions or liability. According to Bloch and Geitner, machinery failures reveal a reaction chain of cause and effect… usually a deficiency commonly referred to as the symptom…”. failure analysis can save money, lives, and resources if done correctly and acted upon. It is an important discipline in many branches of manufacturing industry, such as the electronics industry, where it is a vital tool used in the development of new products and for the improvement of existing products. The failure analysis process relies on collecting failed components for subsequent examination of the cause or causes of failure using a wide array of methods, especially microscopy and spectroscopy. Nondestructive testing (NDT) methods are valuable because the failed products are unaffected by analysis, so inspection sometimes starts using these methods.

Quality control Project management process making sure produced products are good

Quality control (QC) is a process by which entities review the quality of all factors involved in production. ISO 9000 defines quality control as "A part of quality management focused on fulfilling quality requirements".

Focused ion beam

Focused ion beam, also known as FIB, is a technique used particularly in the semiconductor industry, materials science and increasingly in the biological field for site-specific analysis, deposition, and ablation of materials. A FIB setup is a scientific instrument that resembles a scanning electron microscope (SEM). However, while the SEM uses a focused beam of electrons to image the sample in the chamber, a FIB setup uses a focused beam of ions instead. FIB can also be incorporated in a system with both electron and ion beam columns, allowing the same feature to be investigated using either of the beams. FIB should not be confused with using a beam of focused ions for direct write lithography. These are generally quite different systems where the material is modified by other mechanisms.

Anti-reflective coating

An antireflective or anti-reflection (AR) coating is a type of optical coating applied to the surface of lenses and other optical elements to reduce reflection. In typical imaging systems, this improves the efficiency since less light is lost due to reflection. In complex systems such as telescopes and microscopes the reduction in reflections also improves the contrast of the image by elimination of stray light. This is especially important in planetary astronomy. In other applications, the primary benefit is the elimination of the reflection itself, such as a coating on eyeglass lenses that makes the eyes of the wearer more visible to others, or a coating to reduce the glint from a covert viewer's binoculars or telescopic sight.

Each of these system types incorporates a wealth of accessories and consumable items which fit the particular system for a specific application.

Article from MATERIALS WORLD Journal discussing the various sample preparation disciplines that allow for failure analysis of electronic materials and components

Article from ULTRA TEC Web-site discussing the backside sample preparation of a packaged electronic device that allow for (through silicon) backside analysis

Article discussing the applications of jet etch equipment

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Mechanical engineering discipline of engineering

Mechanical engineering is the discipline that applies engineering, physics, engineering mathematics, and materials science principles to design, analyze, manufacture, and maintain mechanical systems. It is one of the oldest and broadest of the engineering disciplines.

Kawasaki Heavy Industries international corporation based in Japan

Kawasaki Heavy Industries Ltd. (KHI) is a Japanese public multinational corporation primarily known as a manufacturer of motorcycles, heavy equipment, aerospace and defense equipment, rolling stock and ships. It is also active in the production of industrial robots, gas turbines, boilers and other industrial products. The company is named after its founder Shōzō Kawasaki, and has dual headquarters in Chūō-ku, Kobe and Minato, Tokyo.

Maintenance (technical) operational and functional checks, servicing, repair or replacing of a product or technical system or parts thereof in order to keep their necessary technical condition

The technical meaning of maintenance involves functional checks, servicing, repairing or replacing of necessary devices, equipment, machinery, building infrastructure, and supporting utilities in industrial, business, governmental, and residential installations. Over time, this has come to often include both scheduled and preventive maintenance as cost-effective practices to keep equipment ready for operation at the utilization stage of a system lifecycle.

Microscope slide

A microscope slide is a thin flat piece of glass, typically 75 by 26 mm and about 1 mm thick, used to hold objects for examination under a microscope. Typically the object is mounted (secured) on the slide, and then both are inserted together in the microscope for viewing. This arrangement allows several slide-mounted objects to be quickly inserted and removed from the microscope, labeled, transported, and stored in appropriate slide cases or folders etc.

Shenyang Ligong University

Shenyang Ligong University is a university in Shenyang, Liaoning, China under the provincial government. Its campus is in a new district of Hunnan New District.

Laser ablation process that removes material from an object by heating it with a laser

Laser ablation or photoablation is the process of removing material from a solid surface by irradiating it with a laser beam. At low laser flux, the material is heated by the absorbed laser energy and evaporates or sublimates. At high laser flux, the material is typically converted to a plasma. Usually, laser ablation refers to removing material with a pulsed laser, but it is possible to ablate material with a continuous wave laser beam if the laser intensity is high enough. Excimer lasers of deep ultra-violet light are mainly used in photoablation; the wavelength of laser used in photoablation is approximately 200 nm.

Waterproofing process of making an object or structure waterproof or water-resistant

Waterproofing is the process of making an object or structure waterproof or water-resistant so that it remains relatively unaffected by water or resisting the ingress of water under specified conditions. Such items may be used in wet environments or underwater to specified depths.

Powder coating is a type of coating that is applied as a free-flowing, dry powder. The main difference between a conventional liquid paint and a powder coating is that the powder coating does not require a solvent to keep the binder and filler parts in a liquid suspension form. The coating is typically applied electrostatically and is then cured under heat to allow it to flow and form a "skin". The powder may be a thermoplastic or a thermoset polymer. It is usually used to create a hard finish that is tougher than conventional paint. Powder coating is mainly used for coating of metals, such as household appliances, aluminium extrusions, drum hardware and automobile and bicycle parts. Newer technologies allow other materials, such as MDF, to be powder coated using different methods. The powder coating process was invented around 1945 by Daniel Gustin US Patent 2538562.

Condition monitoring is the process of monitoring a parameter of condition in machinery, in order to identify a significant change which is indicative of a developing fault. It is a major component of predictive maintenance. The use of condition monitoring allows maintenance to be scheduled, or other actions to be taken to prevent consequential damages and avoid its consequences. Condition monitoring has a unique benefit in that conditions that would shorten normal lifespan can be addressed before they develop into a major failure. Condition monitoring techniques are normally used on rotating equipment, auxiliary systems and other machinery, while periodic inspection using non-destructive testing (NDT) techniques and fit for service (FFS) evaluation are used for static plant equipment such as steam boilers, piping and heat exchangers.

Laser capture microdissection

Laser capture microdissection (LCM), also called microdissection, laser microdissection (LMD), or laser-assisted microdissection, is a method for isolating specific cells of interest from microscopic regions of tissue/cells/organisms.

Electronic packaging is the design and production of enclosures for electronic devices ranging from individual semiconductor devices up to complete systems such as a mainframe computer. Packaging of an electronic system must consider protection from mechanical damage, cooling, radio frequency noise emission and electrostatic discharge. Product safety standards may dictate particular features of a consumer product, for example, external case temperature or grounding of exposed metal parts. Prototypes and industrial equipment made in small quantities may use standardized commercially available enclosures such as card cages or prefabricated boxes. Mass-market consumer devices may have highly specialized packaging to increase consumer appeal. Electronic packaging is a major discipline within the field of mechanical engineering.

Thermal spraying

Thermal spraying techniques are coating processes in which melted materials are sprayed onto a surface. The "feedstock" is heated by electrical or chemical means.

Manufacturing Engineering is a branch of professional engineering. Manufacturing engineering requires the ability to plan the practices of manufacturing; to research and to develop tools, processes, machines and equipment; and to integrate the facilities and systems for producing quality products with the optimum expenditure of capital.

Acoustic quieting is the process of making machinery quieter by damping vibrations to prevent them from reaching the observer. Machinery vibrates, causing sound waves in air, hydroacoustic waves in water, and mechanical stresses in solid matter. Quieting is achieved by absorbing the vibrational energy or minimizing the source of the vibration. It may also be redirected away from the observer.

Ultrasonic thickness gauge

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North University of China

North University of China is a university based in Taiyuan, Shanxi province, China. It was formerly known as North China Institute of Technology from 1993 to 2004. Founded on September 8, 1941 as Taihang Industrial School, and renamed Taiyuan Institute of Machinery in 1958, the university played an important role in the weaponry development and personnel training for the PLA during the Second Sino-Japanese War and the Chinese Civil War. In 2001, senior Party official Bo Yibo wrote the inscription "The First School for People's Ordnance" (人民兵工第一校) at the 60th anniversary of the university.

A thermal history coating (THC) is a robust coating containing various non-toxic chemical compounds whose crystal structures irreversibly change at high temperatures. This allows for temperature measurements and thermal analysis to be performed on intricate and inaccessible components, which operate in harsh environments. Like thermal barrier coatings, THCs provide protection from intense heat to the surfaces on which they are applied. The temperature range that THCs provide accurate temperature measurements in is 900 °C to 1400 °C with an accuracy of ±10 °C.

In electronics, a cross section, cross-section, or microsection, is a prepared electronics sample that allows analysis at a plane that cuts through the sample. It is a destructive technique requiring that a portion of the sample be cut or ground away to expose the internal plane for analysis. They are commonly prepared for research, manufacturing quality assurance, supplier conformity, and failure analysis. Printed wiring boards (PWBs) and electronic components and their solder joints are common cross sectioned samples. The features of interest to be analyzed in cross section can be nanometer-scale metal and dielectric layers in semiconductors up to macroscopic features such as the amount of solder that has filled into a large, 0.125in (3.18mm) diameter plated through hole.