About Montana Nanotechnology Facility (MONT)
Open Access Facilities for Industry, Academia and Government
MONT is here to serve the needs of researchers and engineers in industry, academia, and government. Our open-access facilities have specialized tools and experts to help advance any project.
MONT is one of 16 National Science Foundation supported user facility sites at universities across the US. These 16 sites are collectively known as the National Nanotechnology Coordinated Infrastructure (NNCI). With the pooled resources of the NNCI, MONT is able to aid any user in finding just the right tools and experts needed.
The open-access labs comprising the MONT Facility at MSU are:
The Montana Microfabrication Facility (MMF). The MMF is a micro and nanofabrication facility that offers a range of processing and packaging
capabilities, including photo and electron beam lithography, wet and dry etching,
sputter deposition, thermal and electron beam evaporation, chemical vapor deposition,
metrology, and inspection.
The Imaging and Chemical Analysis Laboratory (ICAL). The laboratory instrumentation in ICAL is dedicated to the characterization
of materials via high-resolution imaging and spectroscopy. ICAL promotes interdisciplinary
collaboration between the research, educational and industrial fields.
The Center for Biofilm Engineering (CBE). The CBE Bio-Imaging Facility is the world’s most advanced, centralized
microscopy lab uniquely suited for biofilm research. With multi-disciplinary teams,
CBE experts develop beneficial uses for microbial bioflims and develop solutions for
industrial relevant biofilm problems.
The Proteomics, Metabolomics and Mass Spectroscopy Facility (Mass Spec). This facility offers a full range of services from single samples to complete shotgun proteomics and metabolomics projects. In addition to providing analytical services, the Facility also operates as an open-access resource with 24/7 availability to researches: users may operate instruments independently for rapid sample analysis and time-sensitive experiments.
The Sample Preparation Facility (prepLab). This facility allows preparation of ultra-high quality polished specimens
for SEM, TEM, EDX, nano-Auger, EBSD and other microbeam analysis requiring flat, smooth,
damage-free surfaces.
The cryo-EM facility (cryo-EM) The current capabilities of the facility include TEM imaging, cryo-grid preparation and screening, single particle analysis, and cryo-electron tomography.
If our facilities do not have the insturments or experts needed for your project,
wecan tap the vasttheNNCI. We are happyto connect you with our partnersto find just what you need. Email director David Dickensheets at davidd@montana.eduor program manager Heather Rauser at heather.rauser@montana.edu.
These multidisciplinary facilities are housed at MSU’s Bozeman campus. They are supported, in part, by the National Science Foundation (Grant# ECCS-2025391) .
Learn more about the NNCI at https://nnci.net
