Our laboratories and facilities are contained in several buildings on campus: Arms, North Mudd, South Mudd, Robinson, Keck, and Braun. In addition, substantial research collaboration exists between geobiology faculty at Caltech and The Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) [link: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/ ]. JPL, NASA’s lead center for planetary exploration, is located seven miles from campus and is administered by the Institute.
The following is a partial list of some of the instruments being currently applied to geobiological projects at Caltech.
Thermo Delta+XP isotope ratio mass spectrometer and Gas Chromatograph
for compound-specific isotopic analysis
Thermo Delta-S isotope ratio mass spectrometer and Costek Elemental
Analyzer for bulk isotopic analysis
Custom-built Spooling Wire Microcombustion interface for isotopic analysis
of trace-level nonvolatile organics
Agilent 6890 GC and Thermo Neptune inductively coupled plasma mass
spectrometer for compound-specific sulfur isotopic analysis
Thermo Trace GC and DSQ-II quadrupole mass spectrometer for analysis
of organic abundance and structure
Los Gatos Research DLT-1000 liquid water isotope analyzer
CEM Mars5 microwave-assisted solvent extraction system.
DeltaVision RT deconvolution microscope (Applied Precision)
CEQ 8800 Capillary Sequencer (Beckman Coulter)
7300 Real-Time PCR System (Applied Biosystems)
Optima TLX Tabletop Ultracentrifuge (Beckman Coulter)
DU 800 UV/Vis Spectrophotometer (Beckman Coulter)
Anaerobic chamber and gassing station (Coy)
Shared microbial culturing facilities
Agilent quadrapole mass spectrometer
Thermo-Finnegan 'Neptune' multi-collector magnetic sector mass spectrometer
Ion Microprobe, Cameca NanoSIMS 50L
Ion Microprobe, Cameca IMS 7f-GEO
NewView 6000 3D Optical Profiler
Electron Probe Micro-analyzer JEOL JXA-8200
Field Emission Scanning Electron Microscope LEO 1550 VP (SE, BSE, CL,
VPSE, FSE, STEM, 3D imaging, EDS, EBSD)
X-ray Fluorescence Spectrometer
Environmental Analysis Center (ESE)
GPS Division Analytical Facility
Beowulf CITerra Computing Cluster
Mars Science Laboratory: A car-sized rover that will launch in the fall of 2011, equipped with a full mobile laboratory designed to assess the habitability of current ancient martian environments, and test for the presence of possible biosignatures. The rover is being built by the Jet Propulsion Laboaratory/Caltech in collaboration with nine Principle Investigators that are building the science instruments. http://msl-scicorner.jpl.nasa.gov/ScienceTeam/