Launch Core Facility Environmental Analytics

Website CFEA

In April, the DFG-funded project to establish a Core Facility Environmental Analytics at the Faculty of Environmental Sciences was launched. The emerging Core Facility brings together 11 institutes and their laboratories from forestry, geosciences and hydrosciences and aims to improve the visibility and accessibility of modern analytical instruments in environmental research for scientists at TU Dresden and their external partners.

The emerging Core Facility Environmental Analytics integrates high-performance and innovative analysis systems to solve complex environmental problems. This includes among others (i) stable isotope analysis systems for process identification and quantification, (ii) diverse spectroscopic methods for the identification of molecular structures in organic substances, (iii) highly sensitive instruments for trace analysis in various environmental compartments, and (iv) high-resolution imaging techniques including Environmental Scanning Electron Microscopy for the investigation of micro- and nanostructures. These core technologies are complemented by a wide range of analytical techniques and methods to characterize the diverse environment samples, thus offering great potential for integrative research in environmental sciences. The Core Facility goes beyond offering analytical tools, it will also promote the exchange of scientists from different disciplines, provide scientific advice to the users on the selection of analytical methods and enable integrative data analysis. Interested students and researchers will have the opportunity to participate in training courses.

The three coordinators of the Core Facility, Dr. Stephan Beil, Dr. Björn Günther and Dr. Patrick Wordell-Dietrich come from the departments of forestry, geosciences and hydrosciences. They provide the central contact and interface between the participating laboratories and users of the Core Facility.

The Core Facility will foster and inspire interdisciplinary research at the forefront of environmental sciences and will enhance the impact of the different disciplines involved at TU Dresden. External partners will get more opportunities for successful collaboration with partners at TU Dresden potentially resulting in generation of new research ideas and their implementation in integrative scientific projects. Thus, the Core Facility Environmental Analytics will give scientifically excellent answers to the complex environmental problems that challenge our society.