University of Calgary - Advanced Contract Award Notice / Notice of Proposed Procurement - Glow Discharge Optical Emission Spectroscopy system

The University of Calgary requires the acquisition, installation, commissioning, training, and support of a research-grade Glow Discharge Optical Emission Spectroscopy (GDOES) system to support advanced materials characterization, materials development, and interdisciplinary research activities within the Department of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering. The proposed system will serve as a core analytical platform supporting a broad range of research programs involving battery materials, corrosion science, protective coatings, semiconductors, hydrogen technologies, advanced manufacturing, energy materials, surface engineering, nanomaterials, and other emerging material systems. Researchers require the ability to accurately determine elemental composition as a function of depth, characterize multilayer structures, identify contaminants and impurities, investigate material degradation mechanisms, and evaluate the effectiveness of coatings and surface treatments. The University requires an analytical solution capable of supporting both routine quantitative characterization and exploratory research applications. In addition to measuring known elemental distributions, the system must provide the capability to detect and identify previously unknown, unexpected, or trace elemental species within a specimen during the same analytical process. This functionality is critical for research involving novel materials and failure analysis investigations where contaminants, reaction products, diffusion products, or unanticipated elemental constituents may significantly influence material performance. The equipment will support multiple research groups and research initiatives and is expected to provide a long-term analytical capability that enables comprehensive elemental depth profiling across a wide range of conductive and non-conductive materials. The system must therefore provide high analytical sensitivity, broad elemental detection capabilities, and the flexibility required to support both current and future research objectives.