About TEMPOS

General Presentation

TEMPOS stands for Transmission Electron Microscopy at Palaiseau, Orsay and Saclay: it unites the efforts of the Université Paris-Sud (UPSud), Ecole polytechnique, CNRS, and CEA to create a world-class centre for transmission electron microscopy (TEM). It is founded on the fame and scientific excellence of the Orsay group (LPS, CNRS-UPSud) in TEM and spectroscopy, on the international reputation of the CNRS's Center for Nanoscience and Nanotechnologies (C2N) in molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) and TEM, on the first class, industry-oriented research into chemical vapour deposition at Laboratoire de Physique des Interfaces et des Couches Minces (LPICM) at Ecole polytechnique, and on the state-of-the-art know-how of the four partners in nanosciences. TEMPOS is a three-pronged project, with two pieces of next-generation equipment devoted to excellence in TEM (CHROMATEM and NANOMAX), and a third pole to back up the development of other local nanoscience activities (NANOTEM). NANOMAX and CHROMATEM aim at expanding the frontiers in the study of individual nano-objects and nanomaterials, from their growth to the most local measurement of their physical properties, with innovative instrumentation. NANOTEM, provides support to the whole nanoscience community on the Campus and also enables the necessary preliminary studies required by the other two microscopes. The TEMPOS project’s objects of study are innovative materials, nanostructures and architectures, including spintronics and “oxitronics” devices, metamaterials, semiconducting nanowires and quantum emitters, carbon nanotubes, functional oxides. By providing a greatly enhanced understanding of their growth mechanisms and their optical and electronic properties, TEMPOS will contribute to the emergence of real applications. This knowledge and technology transfer should be eased by the presence of private companies (Thales RT, St Gobain Recherche) and joint venture laboratories (Thales-CNRS UMφ, St Gobain-CNRS SVI) in the consortium. Beyond, TEMPOS gathers a larger local consortium, and is involved in local, national and international collaborations and facility programms, as described below.

TEMPOS Federating effect

The TEMPOS microscopy teams constitute the majority of the microscopists active at the Paris-Saclay site. In this context, NANOTEM (and in particular the FIB instrument which was sorely needed on the Saclay plateau) had a strong federating effect on the site’s microscopy community. TEMPOS also helped to unite a number of groups around projects that depend ultimately on its groundbreaking microscopes, whether they originate from the CNRS, Paris-Sud University, the Ecole polytechnique or the CEA. The laboratories owning the microscopes (C2N, LPCIM, LPS, LSI) have several non-microscopists teams accessing the microscopes. A set of laboratories have been originally included in the consortium and have active collaborations (LPMC, SGR, SVI, Thalès UMphi, IRAMIS). Other labs from the Paris-Saclay area (ISMO, LAC, SOLEIL, IPVF, UVSQ) or the whole Ile-de-France area (LPEM, IRDEP) are non-consortium members but are actively collaborating. More collaborations have been initiated with laboratories or companies in France and abroad: IES (Montpellier); CRHEA (Sophia Antipolis); GeorgiaTech Lorraine; GPM (Rouen); EPFL (Lausanne); IOFFE(St Petersburg); Glo company (Lund); INL (Lyon); UniCamp, Campinas, Brazil; NTU Singapore; Kyushu University (Japan); Namur University (Belgium); BiomaGune (San Sebastian), Spain; ICFO (Barcelona), Spain; Chalmers university, Sweden; UTT (Troyes); FOTON (Rennes); Institut Néel (Grenoble); SOFRADIR company France It is worth noting the close links that have been formed with St Gobain and the ongoing collaboration with ThalesRT, which have been made possible thanks to TEMPOS. All these local collaborations have had significant structuring, federating and financial leverage effects by stimulating LABEX or ANR projects

Integration of the EquipEx into regional, national, European and global infrastructures

The three poles of TEMPOS (LPS/UPSud, LSI/LPICM/Ecole polytechnique, C2N/CNRS) are integrated into infrastructures already operating partly as platforms, using equipment pre-dating TEMPOS. The LPS (responsible for CHROMATEM) is heavily involved in the French research federation METSA. Access to CHROMATEM is possible for european users through the european ESTEEM 3 INFRA-DEV project. C2N (responsible for NANOTEM and co-responsible for NANOMAX) is part of the RENATECH network of major technology centres. Finally, the LPICM (co-responsible for NANOMAX) hosts the NANOMAX equipment within the Ecole polytechnique’s interdisciplinary microscopy centre, the CimeX . This strong presence in local, national and European structures will be strengthened in the future.