Geology ‘clean room’ a powerful new research tool

By Michael Robin

Dr. Chris Holmden explains work in progress at the trace metal clean room in the Dept. of Geological Sciences. The room makes extensive use of non-reactive plastics like Teflon and boasts a $400,000 dedicated air filtration system, complete with an air lock, for ultra-clean air. Each fume hood work-station also has its own air filtration system. Photo by Michael Robin

A new trace metal clean room and state-of-the-art instrumentation in the Dept. of Geological Sciences will make the University of Saskatchewan one of the best and most advanced geochemical labs on the continent.

"It’s like the dream kitchen you've always wanted – and we’ve got it," says Dr. Chris Holmden, who is leading the initiative.

Holmden began four years ago with a budget of $25,000 and the conviction that the U of S needed to upgrade its geoanalytical labs. According to Dept. Head Dr. Jim Basinger, the existing facilities, built in the 1980s, were simply not clean enough to accommodate the sensitivity of today’s instruments. Corrosion of metal screws on light switches, for example, is enough to skew experiments or simply make them impossible to do.

"We’ve moved on to a new generation of science, and this new generation needs superclean environments." Basinger says.

Holmden began by securing wide faculty support and initial funding. When the Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI) was created, he applied for and received approval for two grants. The first, for $1 million, was used to build the clean room facility, which opened last October.

Holmden’s group is serious about lab cleanliness and purity. Hot plates that are standard equipment in most labs have too much exposed metal, so the group is building its own from plastic heating pads and pure quartz glass. The ultrapure acids used in the clean room would normally cost over $800 per two litre bottle, so Holmden and colleagues have devised a Teflon distillation system to make their own from standard lab-grade acids.

The obsession with cleanliness and purity is all about getting a clean sample for the suite of new equipment that will be installed one floor below. The second CFI grant, for $2.5 million, will be used to buy new instruments for this purpose.

The money will buy two Continuous Flow Isotope Ratio Mass Spectrometers (CF-IRMS) and a Multicollector Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometer (MC-ICP-MS). Holmden explains this last instrument is new technology, developed in the last four years. Only a few top labs have one, and only one other exists in this country, at the University of Quebec in Montreal. Each instrument is custom built, and takes six months to deliver from the time it is ordered.

These tools open totally new areas of science, not only in geology, but in virtually every discipline.

"Isotopes can be used in any scientific question that involves matter," Holmden says.

Holmden’s own field of study is paleoecosystems. The world was not always as it is today. Crustal plates have ground together, raising mountain ranges that in turn have been eroded flat by time and the elements. Sea levels have risen to submerge all but the mountain ranges. All these events have left subtle clues in the earth’s crust that can be teased out with new geoanalytical techniques.

By using isotope research, Holmden and his colleagues are mapping the outlines and dynamics of ancient seas. From this, they can extrapolate what conditions were like on ancient Earth. Together with the work of other researchers, this knowledge can shed light on today’s world, helping us understand issues like global warming and atmospheric change.

Isotope research also can be applied to more prosaic pursuits like creating geological profiles to help find valuable oil and mineral deposits. It can also be used to track toxins in the environment, right back to their sources.

Holmden explains the new analytical tools and techniques are ideal for multidisciplinary research. For the moment, this is limited at the U of S by lack of support staff. However, researchers in the biological sciences elsewhere are harnessing the power of isotopes to shed light on their own questions.

"Biologists are having a field day with it," he says.

Holmden envisions applications in veterinary medicine, agriculture and medicine to name a few. As researchers explore the potential of the new tools, even more applications will be developed.

With the equipment in place, the next step is to hire faculty and staff. The department is currently looking for a biogeochemist to join the faculty, plus a PhD-level lab manager and one electronics technician when the new equipment arrives.

Basinger says in the relatively small geological science community, word is spreading about the facility.

"The first response is ‘University of Saskatchewan, where the heck is that?’", he says. "Then they hear what is here, and they are tremendously impressed."

"All of a sudden people start to get really interested, because these kinds of opportunities are really rare," Basinger says.

For now, Holmden has been spending a lot of time on the phone, telling key people about the facility and the opportunities it offers. It’s a situation he expects to change in the coming years, as highly trained, top quality graduates from the U of S begin making their mark.

"Give us 10 years and people will be calling us."

Articles Index

Next Article

Home · About Us · Issue dates · Submissions · AD Information · Back Issues · Headline Index · OCN Policies