Atom Probe Tomography at The University of Sydney

The Australian Microscopy & Microanalysis Research Facility (AMMRF) operates a national atom probe laboratory at The University of Sydney. This paper provides a brief review and update of the technique of atom probe tomography (APT), together with a summary of recent research applications at Sydney in the science and technology of materials. We describe recent instrumentation advances such as the use of laser pulsing to effect time-controlled field evaporation, the introduction of wide field of view detectors, where the solid angle for observation is increased by up to a factor of similar to 20 as well as innovations in specimen preparation. We conclude that these developments have opened APT to a range of new materials that were previously either difficult or impossible to study using this technique because of their poor conductivity or brittleness.