National Centre for Isotope Geochemistry
The National Centre for Isotope Geochemistry at UCD (NCIG) was established in January 2009 and is located in the UCD School of Earth Sciences. This UCD Academic Centre facilitates inter-disciplinary research in trace element, radiogenic and heavy stable isotope geochemistry by academics from UCD, Trinity College Dublin (TCD), University College Cork (UCC) and the National University of Ireland, Galway (NUIG), as well as many international collaborators.
The Centre's instrumentation was initially funded through the Science Foundation Ireland (SFI) equipment awards to a consortium of applicants from UCD, UCC and TCD. Additional funding was provided by SFI, the Higher Education Authority, the Environmental Protection Agency, UCD, TCD Department of Geology and UCC School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences. Total investment in capital equipment, to date, amounts to more than €2M.
The NCIG is a world-class analytical facility that currently comprises a multiple collector thermal ionisation mass spectrometer (Thermo Scientific Triton), an upgraded high-resolution multiple collector inductively-coupled plasma mass spectrometer (Thermo Scientific Neptune), equipped for in-situ laser-ablation micro-analysis (Analyte G2 193nm Excimer laser from Teledyne Technologies) and coupled to an Aridus desolvation nebuliser and a new Thermo Scientific Neoma instrument. The Neoma is a Multi-Collector Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass-Spectrometer (HR-MC-ICP-MS) with a reaction-gas cell to minimise isobaric interferences that was delivered to UCD in December 2022 and will be commissioned in July 2023, folowing major refurbishment of a new laboratory suite for the NCIG in UCD's Science South building. Two existing Thermo Scientific iCAP Q-ICP-MS instruments will also be housed in the facility and are used respectively for solution-based trace element analyses of waters and acid digested geological/archaeological materials and for trace element measurements (spot and mapping) and U-Pb dating of zircon, apatite and rutile by laser ablation. One of the iCAP Q-ICP-MS instruments is equipped for single nanoparticle detection (SP-ICP-MS) and has enabled recent studies on Au and Ag nanoparticle behaviour in the environment. The facility includes clean labs for microdrilling, sample dissolution and ion-exchange separations as well as mineral separation and other sample preparation methods. Isotope ratio measurements are routinely made in the U-Pb, Pb-Pb, Rb-Sr, Sm-Nd, Re-Os systems, in a wide range of geological materials. U-series dating is carried out using the Neptune instrument which has been upgraded to include two low-noise 1013 Ohm resistors. The new Neoma instrument will greatly extend the range of isotope systems that can be investigated and coupled with the laser system will allow in-situ dating of Rb-rich mineral phases.
NCIG supports the research of four of the School’s research groups: Geochemistry, Petrology & Geochronology, Earth Resources, Marine & Earth Surface Processes and the Palaeoclimate & Quaternary Geoscience Groups. It provides a critical technology platform for several projects within the Irish Centre for Research in Applied Geosciences ((opens in a new window)iCRAG), particularly within its Earth Resources and Earth System Change challenges. Several research projects are in collaboration with the Schools of Agriculture and Food Sciences, Archaeology, Chemistry and Civil Engineering. It also contributes significantly to the laboratory analytical capacity of UCD’s Earth Sciences Institute, notably to its Climate, Water and Energy & Resources themes.