CAIR Facilities
CAIR’s research is carried out in seven dedicated research laboratories and darkrooms.
Facilities include:
- Two Laser Scattering Research Laboratories equipped at state-of-the-art equipment and instrumentation for light scattering research and particle optical characterisation
- Two Instrumentation Research Laboratories equipped with precision machining and fabrication facilities (used primarily by CAIR Particle Instruments Research group)
- A JOEL scanning electron microscope suite with Energy-dispersive X-ray Spectroscopy
- A 60-processor computer cluster supporting both astronomy research and theoretical light scattering modelling research
- Optical, electronic, and mechanical design and simulation software tools including Zemax™, Cadstar™, Inventor™ and other computer tools
- Instruments for the generation, control and characterisation of aerosols and individual airborne particles
- An ‘Objet 30’ 3D-printer facility for rapid prototyping of precision plastic parts used in both fundamental experimental research and instrument development
- A dedicated Atmospheric Analysis Laboratory equipped with Energy Dispersive X-Ray Fluorescence for multi-elemental analysis, Gas Chromatography with Mass Spectrometer, Ion Chromatography, Inductively Coupled Plasma Spectrometry and number of traceable air quality sampling instruments
- Instrumentation for real-time measurement of ultrafine to coarse aerosol number and mass size distributions
CAIR now also operates a remote sensing observatory at the Bayfordbury field station six miles from the University. The Bayfordbury Remote Sensing Observatory is a NASA AERONET site and is equipped with micropulse lidar, robotic sun and lunar photometers, radiometers and all-sky cameras. In the near future two polarimeters will also be installed:- an infra-red spectropolarimeter with a view angle of 60° and an ultra-sensitive sun polarimeter. The latter is a portable version of the PlanetPol polarimeter (previously used in the detection of the alignment of atmospheric dust), capable of measuring fractional polarization down to one part per million.
