We Invest in Technologies Supporting Science & Industry

1981

Kai Siegbahn (20 April 1918 – 20 July 2007) was awarded the 1981 Nobel Prize in Physics, for developing the method of Electron Spectroscopy for chemical analysis, ESCA and XPS. Creating the starting point of Scienta in 1983.

 Scienta Omicron has supported Nobel prize research ever since:

1986

Gerd Binnig and Heinrich Rohrer (at IBM Zürich) were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1986 for their design of the scanning tunnelling microscope (STM). Two years after the Nobel Prize award, Omicron started to offer the first scanning tunneling microscope. STM and later atomic force microscopy (AFM) have matured to a major cornerstone of modern nanoscale characterisation allowing to e.g. visualise individual atoms. 

1986

Professor John C. Polanyi’s 1986 Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded for developing research concepts in Gas-Phase Reaction Dynamics. Professor Polanyi has had a long career advancing research in many areas of Reaction Dynamics and is a champion of fundamental research. Scienta Omicron is proud that Professor Polanyi’s team at the University of Toronto use our products, including our Low Temperature Scanning Tunneling Microscope (LT STM) for their research.

2016

Nobel Prize in Physics, awarded to David Thouless, F. Duncan Haldane and J. Michael Kosterlitz for theoretical discoveries of topological phase transitions and phases of matter, verified on Scienta Omicron R4000 ARPES analysis system.

2019

Nobel Prize in Chemistry, rewarded Akira Yoshino, M. Stanley Whittingham and John Bannister Goodenough for the development of the lithium-ion battery, which is widely used in commercial devices. Energy storage, e.g. batteries, is a fundamental ingredient in the quest for fossil fuel-free energy technologies and research regarding this topic. Scienta Omicron HAXPES, APPES and APXPS technologies play a vital role in this research.

Scienta Omicron provides flexible service levels suitable for all customer demands. Our aim is to be a partner for customer success in research and analysis based on our vast knowledge and experience. We offer support for more than 30 different experimental techniques, and for each one you will find a number of specialists who can support project planning, assessment of technique suitability, system design, equipment training, applications support and system upgrades.

Scienta Omicron offers a wide range of standard modular solutions and continuous access to new technologies through significant investments in R&D. The technology can be acquired as a single component all the way to large configurable clusters of systems – solutions we call “Materials Innovation Platforms (MIP)”.  

Along with our standard offerings; Scienta Omicron also maintains the unique flexibility, expertise and infrastructure to develop completely new concepts to meet any customer's possible special requirement.

Core technologies:

• Spectroscopy: PES – Photoelectron spectroscopy, tool for measuring the chemical and electronic states in different materials. The technology has been developed in several directions, e.g. ARPES for electronic structure, HAXPES for analysis of chemical states in the bulk of materials and APPES for analysis of gas-solid and liquid-solid interfaces.
• Microscopy: SPM - Scanning probe microscopy, measures the physical structure of a surface.
• Thin Film Deposition: MBE - Molecular-Beam Epitaxy, technology for building materials as samples for advanced research.

Scienta Omicron is committed to an exciting and successful future in the field of world-leading surface science and nanotechnology. There is an ongoing effort in place to improving operations and realising synergies.

Scienta Omicron was formed in 2015 by the merger of two of the most renowned companies in the field of Surface Science: VG Scienta and Omicron NanoTechnology. Both companies started their operations early 1980s.