THE “SHORT-COURSE” APPROACH FOR TEACHING ELECTRON MICROPROBE ANALYSIS AT THE GRADUATE LEVEL

At New Mexico Tech, a 1 credit electron microprobe class, “Theory and Practice of Electron Microprobe Analysis” is offered each fall and spring semester. This class is a prerequisite for any graduate student who plans to undertake significant analytical work on the electron microprobe. The goal of this class is to train graduate students to use the Cameca SX-100 microprobe, as well as to give them some background in the theory of electron microprobe analysis. The abbreviated approach to teaching electron microprobe analysis was modeled on a “short-course” format, using an intensive instruction format, and a strong hands-on component to the labs. Each student spends time on the instrument in each lab session, typically performing tasks that they will need to do as an independent user of the microprobe. The class is broken into 6 1-hour lectures and accompanying 2-3 hour laboratory sessions, addressing history of electron microprobe analysis, basic instrumentation, sample preparation, imaging techniques, quantitative analysis, and data handling. The labs accompanying each lecture are hands-on, typically taught on the same day as the lecture and addressing topics that were discussed in the lecture session. Class size is capped at 8 students, with a typical enrollment of 4 and 8, usually in the fields of geology, geochemistry or material science. Because of the small class size, the topics covered in the class can be, to some extent, geared towards individual student's thesis projects. Although no student projects are required as part of the class, each student is given a “free day” on the instrument to carry out analyses on their thesis samples, or any other samples that they choose to analyze.

Although this abbreviated approach to teaching a class is certainly not ideal, we find it to an effective approach in an institutional setting where there is no dedicated faculty member teaching an electron microprobe class, but instruction is provided instead by research and laboratory staff whose time is largely filled by non-teaching responsibilities. We find that students who have been through the class are able to use the instrument independently, and have enough theoretical background to educate themselves more fully, using scientific literature and reference works, on the analyses that they undertake in their thesis research.