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Material Measurement Laboratory

Chemical Sciences Division

Projects/Programs

Displaying 1 - 25 of 135
Photograph of a labeled amber bottle containing SRM 2429.

Activated Carbon and FGD Gypsum Standard Reference Materials

Completed
The role of mercury in the environment is now receiving close scrutiny because ultimately it can bioaccumulate as alkyl mercury in seafood with subsequent risk to human health through trophic transfer. Many industrial sources of mercury have been effectively reduced in recent years, but atmospheric
Photograph depicting IC manufacturing showing glowing squares on a round wafer, with a yellow triangular warning indicator labeled UV.

Advanced IC Interconnects - Process Metrology and Models

Ongoing
Atomic layer deposition (ALD) is increasingly being utilized as a method of depositing the thin (nanometer-scale), conformal layers required for many microelectronics applications, including high - gate dielectric layers, diffusion barrier layers, copper seed layers, and DRAM dielectric layers
Interior view of a long, multistory scientific facility filled with large tubular guides, elevated walkways, and electronic instrumentation.

Advanced Materials Characterization

Ongoing
This program seeks to continually enhance the analytical competence of MML and other major operating units at NIST. Furthermore, the program makes available technical capabilities that U.S. industry and government need in their quest to compete on a global scale through improving methods and
Photograph of gas cylinders

Audit of EPA Protocol Gas Suppliers

Ongoing
Protocol gas standards are employed in measurements made for compliance purposes; one of the major uses is for measurements of regulated gaseous species from stationary source emitters, i.e., stack gases. Many of these stationary sources are regulated through the Cap and Trade program; therefore
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Bringing the SI to Global Atmospheric Greenhouse Gas Measurement

Ongoing
This multifaceted program leverages expertise in three complementary technical focus areas- all of which involve SI-traceable measurements of relevant atmospheric species such as carbon dioxide, methane, water vapor and oxygen. The efforts include gravimetrically based preparation of primary
Image showing a variety of gas tanks with carbon dioxide

Carbon Dioxide Measurements and Reference Materials

Ongoing
CO 2 Reference Materials The Gas Sensing Metrology Group at NIST has a long history of providing reference materials to industry, monitoring communities, and academia. The program began in the 1970’s by developing an initial suite of CO2 primary standard mixtures (PSMs) to support the US Department
Wordcloud consisting of words CCQM metrology group task etc.

CCQM Activities in the Gas Analysis Working Group

Ongoing
The results from these Key comparisons will be used to benchmark the appropriate Calibration and Measurement Claims (CMCs) of the participating NMIs. CMCs are basically the declared capabilities that an NMI offers to customers, and they are included in a searchable database at the BIPM web site
CCQM Intercomparisons

CCQM Activities in the Organic Analysis Working Group

Ongoing
The results from these studies will be used to demonstrate the capabilities of participating NMIs for their similar measurement services, and eventually benchmark the appropriate  Calibration and Measurement Capabilities (CMCs) that summarizes this capability.  NIST CMCs that directly support SI
Photograph of three Standard Reference Materials of various soil matrices.

Certification of Three Soil SRMs for Inorganic Environmental Measurements

Completed
The three NIST soil SRMs, 2709, 2710 and 2711, have been used worldwide by hundreds of laboratories; combined sales typically exceed 800 units per year. Use of these SRMs provides our customers with tools that are essential for achieving quality assurance in the analysis of contaminant elements in
Photograph of a unit of RM 8027 Silicon Nanoparticles (Nominal Diameter 2 nm) showing a labeled box and ampoules.

Chemical Characterization of Nanoparticles

Ongoing
NIST has a broad research program spread throughout the major operating units aimed at building the supporting technical capabilities that U.S. industry needs in their quest to develop new nanotech products with desirable new capabilities and bring them safely to market. The Chemical Sciences
Photograph of titanium metal crystal with cubic symmetry.

Chemical Metrology for Metals, Ores, and Related Materials

Ongoing
In the arena of industrial commodities, the primary challenges are to provide measurement tools and reference materials that allow U.S. industry to establish comparability of measurement results to results obtained by customers, competitors, and regulators for the basic chemical properties of
Photograph of three labeled bottles of SRM 2855 containing low-density and high density polyethylene

Chemical Metrology for Polymers Manufacturing

Ongoing
This project is designed to strengthen the analytical capabilities of polymers manufacturers by introducing reference materials, critically evaluating standard test methods, and educating those industry representatives who participate in standards development organizations. Certified reference
Map of the Northern hemisphere Pacific Ocean, with environmental specimen sampling sites indicated with data points in the Hawaiian Islands, Alaska, and Bering Sea locations.

Classification Methods for the NIST Biorepository

Ongoing
NIST has been archiving biological and environmental specimens, including marine animal and environmental samples, for over 40 years. Currently, these biospecimens are stored at cryogenic temperatures in the NIST Biorepository located at the Hollings Marine Laboratory in Charleston, SC. Various
Illustration of satellite sensing of sunlight reflected by buildings, roads, water and trees to assess radiative warming of the earth.

Climate Science

Ongoing
This program encompasses multifaceted efforts to advance the metrology of climate science. Projects include: development of ultra-high accuracy optical standards and technologies to determine greenhouse gases (GHGs) concentrations, atmospheric lifetimes, and aerosol radiative forcing development of
Photograph of a unit of SRM 3950 showing a labeled box and two frost covered amber bottles.

Clinical Measurements Quality Assurance Program

Ongoing
The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) established the Clinical Measurements Quality Assurance Program (ClinQAP) to support the measurement needs of the clinical community. Participants measure concentrations of marker compounds, contaminants, metabolites in clinical samples (e.g
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Comparative Mammalian Proteome Aggregator Resource (CoMPARe) Program

Ongoing
Comparative proteomics strives to gain insight into key underlying molecular changes that result in unique phenotypes across related taxa. Proteomic analysis complements comparative genomics by providing evidence of protein abundance, orthogonal to gene copy number and amount of transcript. To
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Comparative Serum Proteomics Project

Ongoing
State-of-the-art biomolecular analysis is no longer limited to model organisms and is becoming routine in non-model organisms. Major drivers of this emerging bioanalytical capacity include increasing accessibility and quality of sequenced genomes as well as high-resolution fast-duty cycle mass
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Consistency Analysis and Uncertainty in ‘omic Data

Ongoing
‘Omics is increasingly moving out of the laboratory and towards use in industrial and commercial applications. For instance, in biomanufacturing, there is a need for quality control when developing biotherapeutics, which will almost certainly require a machine-learning classifier to separate
Photograph of SRM 114r Portland Cement Fineness Standard showing labeled mylar bag and vial.

Continuing Support of Cement Manufacturing

Ongoing
NIST SRMs for Portland cement and related materials are the de facto world standards for validation of analytical methods for testing of cement for compliance with manufacturing specifications and for qualification of laboratories throughout the supply chain, including cement plants, construction
Big data analysis report on 3D effects.AI technology generated image

Data Tools for Environmental Metrology

Ongoing
A recent addition to operations in the NIST Biorepository, we seek out places where NIST scientists get bogged down by the complexity of their data. Research at NIST can generated some of the most complex data in the world, at times requiring six months or more of processing to get to the data
3d atom molecules chained together floating against blue background, generative ai

Density Functional Tight Binding Methods

Presently the study by quantum chemistry techniques of large (several thousands of atoms) molecular systems is limited by large computer time and space (memory, disk) requirements. The required time, memory, and disk space to solve the requisite equations typically increase exponentially with the

Determinations of Boron Deposit Quality by Neutron Depth Profiling

Ongoing
Neutrons are not easily detected with high resolution and good efficiency. Consequently, high-quality neutron detectors remain a challenge to manufacture. A few nuclides such as He-3, Boron-10, and Li-6 are commonly used to convert impinging neutrons into an electrical pulse that post-processing