Tripati Lab
UCLA Geochemistry Facility
We are affiliated with the Department of Earth, Planetary, and Space Sciences, the Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, the Institute of the Environment and Sustainability, the Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics, and the California Nanosystems Institute.
We are available for outside users and for courses. This lab is one of a few in the country with the capability of making clumped isotope measurements and is available for internal and external users. Please contact us at atripati “at” g “dot” ucla "dot" edu for UC and non-UC rates and scheduling.
Clumped isotope geochemistry
The laboratory houses the following instrumentation for clumped isotopes:
1. A Thermo FInnigan MAT 253 gas source mass spectrometer specially configured to make precise clumped isotope measurements of mass 47 CO2 ("Chewbacca").
2. A Nu Perspective IS mass spectrometer that is specially configured to make precise clumped isotope measurements ("R2D2").
3. A homemade sample reaction and gas purification system comprised of a Costech autosampler, common acid bath, multiple cryogenic traps, and a Thermo gas chromatograph ("Han Solo").
4. A homemade autosampler and gas purification system coupled to an Agilent gas chromatograph ("The Sarlac").
For carbonates, our minimum samples sizes range from 3-6 mg of CaCO3.
Environmental analytical facilities
5. We also have arecently added a Thermo Delta and a hydrogen device to the facility.
6. We have a Varian Vista inductively-coupled optical emission spectrophotometer (ICP-OES) for elemental measurements in the facility.
7. There are also three vacuum lines for cryogenic purification of carbonate samples and standards, and several water baths for inorganic precipitation experiments and gas equilibration.
One room has a chemical fume hood and multiple rooms have compressed gas cylinder racks. All labs are safety compliant.
All instruments are computer controlled. Two additional computers are available for data reduction. Back-up software is also used.
This facility was established through the support of the National Science Foundation (EAR/IF program), the UCLA Division of Physical Sciences, the UCLA Shared Resources Consortium, the Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics, and the UCLA Center for Study of Evolution and the Origin of Life.
The lab has a Star Wars naming convention because we are geeks. The mass spectrometer has plenty of space available for sponsorship. We also have the ‘Eye of Sauron’ in our vacuum line and mineral precipitation lab.
