Centre for Oil Sands Sustainability (COSS)

Equipment

Function

Ultra High Performance Liquid Chromatograph with Quadrupole Time-of-Flight Mass Spectrometer (UHPLC-QTOFMS)

The QTOF is equipped with 3 different ion sources, electrospray ionization (ESI), atmospheric pressure photoionization (APPI) and atmospheric pressure chemical ionization (APCI) to enable a wide variety of samples to be analyzed. The UHPLC enables the separation of components in complex mixtures

Matrix-Assisted Laser Desorption/Ionization Time-of-Flight Mass Spectrometer (MALDI-TOF)

Capabilities include characterization of homopolymer and copolymer molecular weight distributions, composition and deconvolution of homopolymer and copolymer mixtures, hydrocarbon analysis quantification and characterization

X-ray diffraction (XRD) with small and wide angle X-ray scattering (SAXS/WAXS)

Used for materials characterization such as crystal structure, physical properties of materials and thin film

Wavelength Dispersive X-ray Fluorescence Spectrometer (XRF)

Capabilities include elemental analysis in different kinds of samples: solids, liquid or powder

Atomic Force Microscope – Raman (AFM-Raman)

Used to link the molecular information obtained by confocal Raman microscopy with the high-resolution surface information (structural and topographic surface imaging on the nanometer scale) acquired by AFM

Avanti J-26XP Centrifuge

Separation of solids from bitumen

Thermal Gravimetric Analyzer (TGA)

Utilized for thermal analysis in which physical and chemical properties of materials changes with temperature, such as decomposition, degradation mechanism, thermal stability, oxidation, combustion

Particle size analyzer

Used to analyze particle size distribution of different materials, such as solids, emulsion solutions

Micro Carbon Residue Analyzer (MCR)

Used for the characterization of coke formation tendency

UV–vis Spectrophotometer

Analyze a variety of samples by conventional spectroscopy but advanced techniques can be implemented using the fibre optic accessory

Bruker 450 Gas Chromatograph (2 units)

Equipped for high temperature simulated distillation

Bruker Varian 3900 Gas Chromatograph

Equipped with a split/split less injector and flame ionization detector (FID) and is used for the analysis of lower boiling point components

Bruker Fourier Transform Infrared Spectrometer (FTIR)

FTIR with fixed path; attenuated reflectance and diffuse reflectance cells for the analysis of wide variety of organic compounds, films and powders

Anton Paar SVM 3000 Viscometer

Used to measure the dynamic viscosity and density of oily samples and is equipped with a 48-position auto-sampler