About

Who Are We?

Located in the historic Thorvaldson Building on the University of Saskatchewan campus; the Saskatchewan Structural Sciences Centre (SSSC) resides as the largest shared analytical instrument facility on campus. The SSSC, which began in 2000, has been funded through the Canadian Foundation for Innovation and grants from NSERC, Western Diversification, and the Provincial government. The University of Saskatchewan provides on-going funding for the Centre to provide training to students and researchers from fields of health and life sciences, agriculture, and engineering. The SSSC has assisted in conducting experiments on structure and composition of materials, developing new analytical methodologies, and maintaining instruments in a research-ready mode.

What Do We Do?

The highly qualified SSSC staff members support both novice and expert users and facilitate interdisciplinary research in this core research Centre. The staff offer training in:

  • Theory
  • Data acquisition on the facilities' instrumentation
  • Mass Spectrometry
  • X-ray Crystallography
  • Cutting edge applied Biological Sciences
  • Reactivity and functionality with Atomic Force Microscopy
  • Confocal Raman Microscopy
  • Laser Scanning Confocal Fluorescence Microscopy with Fast Lifetime Measurement Capability
The staff also collaborate in developing novel analytical techniques and conduct contract studies for researchers within and external to the University.

Awards & Grants

The instrumentation in the SSSC was funded through the following awards to University Professors. The total investment in research infrastructure at the SSSC exceeds $15,000,000.

NSERC RTI Pan et. al. Critical Upgrade for a Bruker EMX ESR Spectrometer 2016
CFI LEF Pedras et al., Biomolecular Research Facilities: Supporting Agricultural, Health and Environmental Sciences 2013
NSERC RTI Muller et al., Upgrade of X-ray diffractometer for small molecules 2012
NSERC RTI Dalai et. al., Combined Raman and Fourier Transform Infra-Red (FTIR) Upgrade 2011
NSERC RTI Steer et. al., Essential equipment for temporal characterizations of transients in solar photon upconversion systems 2010
NSERC RTI Evits et. al., Improving Scanning Probe Microscopy for Imaging Nano-particles 2010
NSERC Tse et. al. , High-Pressure Spin Probe 2010
NSERC RTI Steer et. al., Essential Repairs for Ti: sapphire laser systems 2008
NSERC RTI Kozinski et. al., Synchrotron Raman microscopy 2008
NSERC RTI Steer et. al. , Accessories for Raman Spectrometer 2003

 

Our Team

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Philip Effah Boahene
Post-doctoral fellow
Sarah Purdy
Research Associate
Dr. Danielle Covelli
Laboratory Manager
Ahmad Rahman
IT Software Analyst
Emma Bruce
Admin Assistant
Chintamani Thapa
Admin Assistant
Dr. Palok Aich
Research Officer
Robert Bauer
Research Assistant
Keith Brown
Laboratory Manager
Dr. Sophie Brunet
Research Officer
Farley Chicilo
Research Assistant
Brook Danger
Research Associate
Dr. Umashankar Das
Research Associate
Dr. Ken Falk
Research Associate
Michael Newton
Research Assistant
Dr. Sergi Nokhrin
Research Associate
Dr. Gabrielle Schatte
Research Officer
Jordan Scheirich
 Summer Student
Dr. Wilson Quail
 Emeritus Professor
Stephen Foley
 Associate Professor
Shuting Shi
 Post-Doctoral Fellow
Steven Langdon
 Research Officer
Ketan Kumar Sandhi
 Graduate Research Analyst
Ken Thoms
 Laboratory Manager
Julie Thompson
 Research Officer

Frequently Asked Questions

The SSSC is available to all individuals associated with the University of Saskatchewan. It is also available to users outside of the University, however, please contact the SSSC main desk for your specific situation.

Becoming a SSSC user requires a simple registration process. Please visit the dedicated section for SSSC registration. 

The Saskatchewan Structural Sciences Centre is located in the Thorvaldson building basement on campus. For full contact details go here.

The Saskatchewan Structural Sciences Centre (SSSC) is acknowledged for providing facilities to conduct this research. Funding from Canada Foundation for Innovation, Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada and the University of Saskatchewan support research at the SSSC.

Evolution is the SSSC's equipment management website. Most users access Evolution to schedule equipment for their research. If you plan on using an instrument for research at the SSSC, an account is required.

If you do not have an evolution account, one will be set up for you, after the submission of the trainee registration. Submit the trainee registration form to sssc.admin@usask.ca. If you are a repeate user, this step is completed. This information is also found in Prepartation for Visiting Our Labs.

Ensure the information you have entered is correct. If you still cannot log in, your Evolution account has likely expired. Please contact one of our experts to renew your account. If you have recently registered a new account, allow 1-2 days for our system to update.