Funding for the acquisition of a Field Emission Gun Scanning Electron Microscope (FEGSEM) equipped with Energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX) and Electron Backscatter Diffraction Analysis (EBSD) that will allow the centre to incorporate the following capabilities:

• Characterization of non-conductive materials
• Carrying out mechanical tests in-situ at high temperature and high resolution,
• Electron channeling contrast imaging (ECCI),
• EDX and EBSD map acquisition
• automatic acquisition of large area images with high resolution, required for the use of high resolution digital image correlation techniques (HRDIC).