[en] Mineralogical Association of Canada Short Course 30 called Synchrotron Radiation: Earth, Environmental and Materials Sciences Applications was held in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan in 2002. This short course attempts to introduce to the general earth science community some of the basics of synchrotron radiation-based research. It is not intended as a review of all aspects of every synchrotron-based technique, although it does include the important literature into which knowledge of more specific areas can be gained. Instead, it covers the basics of synchrotron research at a level suitable for those interested in beginning to use synchrotron radiation in their research. Chapter 1 covers the physics of synchrotron radiation and synchrotron storage rings in general. Chapter 2 details what the Canadian Light Source is, what it will be capable of, and the types of experiments that will be able to be performed on the beamlines. Chapter 3 covers the basics of synchrotron-based diffraction studies including both powder and single crystal studies. Chapter 4 introduces the novice user to X-ray absorption spectroscopy (EXAFS/XANES) and includes details on how to correctly reduce the data. Chapter 5 outlines the capabilities of the X-ray microprobe for chemical analyses, micro-EXAFS/XANES and imaging of geological samples. Chapter 6 gives a detailed overview of synchrotron-based X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy with application to mineralogical and geochemical studies. Finally, chapter 7 introduces the types of experiments within the geological community that are commonly performed on amorphous materials

[en] This chapter briefly reviews the interactions between X-rays and matter that create and absorb X-rays, describes the major components of a modern SXRF-microprobe, discusses its operation, and provides examples of recent applications of this instrument. My perspective in this chapter is that of a user, a scientist who has analytical questions that the SXRF-microprobe can answer. (author)

[en] The aim of this paper is to give a brief overview of the more recent developments, and of the techniques and practical aspects of extracting useful structural information from powder and single crystal diffraction patterns. The examples selected and discussed below are for illustrative purposes and as such do not represent a complete survey of the applications of diffraction in the geosciences or on the investigation of a particular subject. (author)

[en] This introduction is intended to present an overview of synchrotron radiation to new and potential synchrotron users. Emphasis is placed on the essential elements of synchrotron radiation technology from the users' perspectives. More specific applications of synchrotron technology will be dealt with elsewhere in this workshop. (author)

[en] The intentions of this review are threefold. The first goal is to introduce the mineralogist and geochemist to the terminology used by chemists and physicists when discussing XPS studies. This is fundamentally important because terminology rather than conceptual aspects commonly dissuade earth scientists from utilizing XPS. The second goal is to present a simple theoretical treatment of XPS, and the third is to provide guidance for interpreting XPS spectra. The chapter hopefully offers sufficient information to conduct publication-level research on minerals and their reactivity. (author)

[en] This chapter will examine the use of synchrotron radiation studies, specifically X-ray scattering and X-ray absorption spectroscopy, to the study of the structure of disordered or amorphous materials. While these types of materials commonly exist in nature, e.g., liquid water, volcanic glass, and have a wide range of industrial applications, our ability to elucidate their atomic structure is greatly hampered by the fact that their internal structural arrangements differ from crystalline materials. (author)

[en] It is the purpose of this article to describe the CLS (Canadian Light Source) facility in general terms (Sham 2002 looks at the production of SR in more detail), then describe the beamlines at the CLS that will be of interest to the EEMSA group, and suggest ways of gaining access to foreign SR facilities in the next two years and the CLS after 2004. Most of the innovative science in EEMSA at the CLS and other third generation synchrotrons will be described in other articles in this volume especially hard X-ray examples. We will conclude this article with examples of innovative research that can be carried out at the CLS in the IR and soft X-ray regions, which are not covered in other articles to our knowledge. (author)

[en] Attempts are made in this chapter to explain qualitatively some necessary physics involved and link them to the final product, i.e. the structural parameters. Through real data examples, the strength and limitations of various methods are discussed. The data selected for the illustration purposes are mostly based on the convenience and availability to the author and are usually from the past two years of study. The first section gives a basic description of the physics of XAFS spectroscopy and its information content, section 2 deals with the experimental aspects and in section 3 we go through the data reduction in a step-by-step fashion, and the quantitative structural information extracted by modeling and non-linear least-squares curve fitting. In the last part of the paper a few recent studies are used as further examples of XAFS applications in the geological sciences. (author)