Who we are?

We are a not-for-profit, educational organization that:
  • Encourages the sharing of techniques developed, or being developed, to provide research-quality targets and reference samples, mostly for basic research in physics, chemistry, and related sciences.
  • Mentors people new to target and sample preparation.
  • Provides modest financial support for hosts of INTDS conferences and for selected speakers.
  • Publishes the techniques of target preparation and related topics in a manner easily located in the scientific literature. The INTDS bibliography index lists currently over 1160 articles and is searchable with relevant keywords, authors name, journal or paper title. Early articles were published in proceedings edited by organisers as institutional report. Later the proceedings of INTDS conferences were published in publicly available journals.
   List of our interests includes:
– Preparation techniques for thin films, e.g., vacuum evaporation/condensation, sputtering, electrochemical deposition, powder distribution and compaction, and roll thinning;
– Separation and chemical processing of stable and radioactive isotopes;
– Preparation and characterization of high-purity and special materials;
– Development of highly material-sparing methods of targets preparation;
– Effects of contaminants;
– Target and sample encapsulation;
– Radiation and beam heating effects;
– Accelerator targets for radionuclide production;
– Availability of isotopes;
and,
– Target and sample thicknesses from gas densities to kg/cm2. 

  

We trace our roots to 1963 and the First Symposium on Research Materials for Nuclear Measurements, sponsored by the Central Bureau   for Nuclear Measurements (CBNM, later IRMM – Institute for Reference Materials and Measurements and now EC-JRC) in Belgium. Since than we share experience and discuss the problems related to the target preparation during conferences (recently biennial) hosted alternatively mainly in Europe and North America but as well by research centres located in other places. The latest, already 29th, was organised by FRIB, MSU and took place in East Lansing, Michigan, USA in October 2018. The target makers community was represented by ~55 participants from Research Centres of Europe, Asia, America, South Africa.
Many of the subjects of interest to the INTDS are related to the preparation of thin foils. Our members are engaged in sample preparations for research in nuclear physics, nuclear energy, biology, geology, space science, medical diagnosis and cancer treatment, and for the calibration of scientific instruments.