The First LT STM in South America: Nanobiomaterials Laboratory, Universidad Técnica Federico Santa María, Chile

February 13th, 2022

Scienta Omicron is supremely proud and thrilled to announce that we have delivered the first Low Temperature Scanning Tunneling Microscopy (LT STM) to the South American continent. The first ever LT STM has been delivered to Nanobiomaterials Laboratory, Universidad Técnica Federico Santa María, Chile. Prof. Carolina Parra Gonzalez, the director of the Nanobiomaterials Lab comments: “The LT STM will become an extremely useful tool for the local and international “nano”-community comprised of physicists, chemists, and biologists – allowing many interdisciplinary collaborations.”

Low Temperature STM, an essential tool for most of the nanomaterial and nanotechnology research centres in Europe, Asia, and USA, has not yet been available in South American universities. However, that is about to change with the first LT STM being delivered to the Nanobiomaterials Laboratory at the Universidad Técnica Federico Santa María in Valparaiso, Chile (funded through the FONDEQUIP initiative of the Chilean Ministry of Science). 

Prof. Carolina Parra Gonzalez, director of the Nanobiomaterials Lab comments: “I am convinced the Scienta Omicron LT STM system will place nanoscience in Chile at a high level, comparable to and competitive with international research centres. It will become an extremely useful tool for the local and international “nano”-community comprised of physicists, chemists, and biologists—allowing many interdisciplinary collaborations.” The addition of the Scienta Omicron LT STM will profoundly advance the Nanobiotechnology group’s current work on the growth and study of relevant quantum materials including topological insulators, superconductors, dichalcogenides, heterostructures and other low-dimensional systems. Before now, this has only been possible thanks to a collaboration with researchers at Stanford University in the USA.