Services offered

The member institutions of the CGCC provide a wide array of analytical services to the whole scientific community in Québec. The equipment at the disposal of our members is among the most recent available, and the techniques brought into play are unique and state-of-the-art. Almost any kind of samples, ranging from the solid, liquid and solution state can be analyzed. The staff members who run and operate the constituent laboratories all have an excellent scientific background and years of expertise in their respective fields. Its very comprehensive pool of instruments is designed to integrate many fundamental aspects of university research: it offers training of graduate students and postdoctoral fellows and it provides specialized services on a regional basis to universities and industries. The following sub-sections describe the user fee structure in effect and the instrumentation available.

Price Rates
Nuclear Magnetic Resonance
Mass Spectrometry
X-Ray Crystallography
Elemental Analysis
High Throughput Synthesis
Continuous Flow Synthesis
Optical Spectroscopy
Surface Analysis
Compound Characterization

Les frais d'utilisation varient selon la complexité ou l'origine de l'échantillon à analyser. Essentiellement, il y a trois différents types de services :

1) Les coûts d'utilisation les plus bas sont réservés aux groupes de recherche des membres du CCVC, peu importe l'emplacement du service requis.
2) Une deuxième catégorie de coûts est établie pour les membres universitaires des institutions avoisinantes.
3) Une troisième catégorie de coûts d'utilisation s'applique aux groupes de recherche de l'industrie.

It is also possible to have a special arrangement with a specific laboratory if numerous analyses are to be submitted over a certain period (quantity discount), but these are negotiated on a case-by-case basis with the manager in charge. For detailed price rates, check out the user fee policy

The spectrometers accessible to CGCC members through participating institutions cover practically all NMR needs of any researchers in chemistry and material sciences from academic, government or industry laboratory. The range of services offered includes liquid-phase and solid-phase high-resolution experiments as well as diffusion and microimaging experiments.

The High Field NMR Laboratory located at Université de Montréal has acquired 10 NMR spectrometers, of which 3 are particularly significant: a Bruker 600 MHz wide-bore instrument for solid-state NMR and microimaging; a Bruker AVII 700 MHz spectrometer with a cryoprobe optimized for ¹³C; and a Bruker AVIII 400 MHz with a Prodigy cryoprobe. The Laboratory is equipped with automatic sample changers as well as triple resonance probes allowing the analysis of complex structures.

The McGill infrastructure comprises of a suite of six medium field NMR spectrometers for small molecule structure determination consisting of Varian/Agilent 300 and 400 MHz spectrometers with multi-nuclear capabilities and a second 300 MHz instrument equipped with an automatic sample changer. A 500 MHz spectrometer has been upgraded with a third channel and an HCN probe. Also recently installed were Bruker 400 and 500 MHz instruments, the latter with an automatic sample changer.

Location: Université de Montréal, McGill University
Managers: Tan Phan Viet (UdeM) and Kirill Levin (McGill)

The equipment made accessible to CGCC members by hosting institutions provides rapid and highly accurate measurements for routine analyses, covering a very wide range of bio-analytical mass spectrometry applications and addressing analytical needs in organic, inorganic, environmental, and biological chemistry. Some of the instrumentation allow analysis of high molecular weight samples like polymers, intact proteins in linear mode and analyze peptides, oligosaccharides or small molecules.

The UdeM infrastructure offers 8 mass spectrometers. These instruments include an LC-MSD TOF (Agilent), an Auto Flex MALDI TOF (Bruker), an LC-LCQ (Thermo Scientific), a preparative LC-MSQ (Thermo Scientific), a capLC-MSD Quad (Agilent), a TSQ Quantum Ultra (Thermo Scientific), a mass spectrometer for liquid chromatography-ion mobility time of flight detection (Waters) and a GC-MSD Quad (Agilent).

The McGill infrastructure includes a Kratos MS25RFA high resolution spectrometer with EI-Cl source and FAB capability, an ORBITRAP ESI/APCI from Thermo with LC capability, a Thermo GC/MS, an AB MALDI-TOF, an Agilent GC-quad MS, a Finnigan Ion Trap Detector Model 700 coupled to a Varian 3500 Capillary GC, and a Finnegan LCQ/DUO HPLC/MS.

Location: Université de Montréal, McGill University
Manager: Alexandra Furtos (UdeM)

The crystallography laboratories from the diverse sites offer rapid and high-quality routine analyses and support the research projects of CGCC members and external collaborators in chemistry and biochemistry. They use X-ray diffraction to determine the three-dimensional, single crystal structures of small molecules. Their instruments can solve the vast majority of structural problems and can operate at room temperature or lower. Three instruments operate normally with either X-Ray microtube (Cu) or rotating anodes (Cu).

To nicely complement its facilities, McGill also hosts a laboratory specifically designed for X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, which is indispensable for research in heterogeneous and homogenous catalysis. It provides researchers with state-of-the-art capability to determine precise analytical determination of the elemental composition of the materials used in this research, and their oxidation states. It includes a Siemens D-5000 diffractometer equiped with Grobel mirrors and grating incidence attachment, a Bruker D8 equipped with an area detector (MDEIE-McGill, 2008), and an Omnicron XPS with ISS capability.

The UdeM infrastructure has been acquired since 2005. Key instruments include 3 single-crystal CCD diffractometers (2 with rotating anodes); 1 robot for high-throughput structural analysis; 3 powder diffractometers (1 with a scintillation detector, 1 with an array detector for high-throughput analysis, and 1 for analysis of fibres (WAXS)); 4) diffractometers for scattering and reflectivity (SAXS); 1 robotic system for high-throughput crystallization.

Location: Université de Montréal, McGill University
Manager: Michel Simard (UdeM)

The UdeM infrastructure, which includes an Eager EA 1108 Elemental Analyzer and a Costech ECS 4010, offers a variety of analyses and services for CGCC members and for contract customers. They can perform simultaneous analyses of carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen and sulfur in organic and inorganic materials (solids, liquids, oils, etc.).

Location: Université de Montréal
Manager: Francine Bélanger-Gariépy (UdeM)

CGCC members have access to key equipment for high throughput synthesis as well as for analysis and purification of organic molecules. This infrastructure is novel, as it meets the needs of discovery in biotechnology as well as in nanotechnology.

The overall infrastructure includes multi-well reactors for both solution and solid phase synthesis, Mettler-Toledo automated synthesizers and weighing stations, two Biotage microwave reactors with robotics, Biotage flash chromatography systems, analytical and preparative Agilent SFC systems, a Waters MS-UV triggered LC-MS AutoPrep system, evaporative centrifuges and lyophilizers, tracking software, and other equipments.

The UdeM facilities provide a novel, efficient and powerful approach to access molecules that have been traditionally prepared using multi-step sequences involving chemical reactions, extractions and purifications. CGCC members can address a new way to assemble molecules facilitating the whole synthesis process by using continuous flow synthesis on microscopic scales (exploiting microfluidic <0.1 g), mesoscopic scales (0.1-1.0 g) and macroscopic scales (>10 g). The flow systems allow CGCC researchers to use more reactive intermediates while developing safer synthetic processes, which can be carried out on larger scales with potential applications to generate molecules of therapeutic interest.

The infrastructure includes microreactors dedicated to either small scale or large scale synthesis. It has the H-Cube from ThalesNano (a system devoted to hydrogenation without the use of hydrogen cylinder), a microwave heated stop-flow reactor (Voyager from CEM), two Uniqsis flow reactors with robotics and gas addition modules, six R2 + R4 Vapourtec flow systems equipped with cooling, robotics and gas addition modules.

Location: Université de Montréal, McGill University
Manager: Vanessa Kairouz (UdeM)

The McGill infrastructure contains a micro-Raman spectrometer (Renishaw), a Raman spectrometer with fiber optic (Kaiser), and a triple spectrographs (Princeton Instruments). These instruments provide state-of-the-art details about reaction mechanisms and intermediates, particularly in studies involving heterogeneous catalysis.

Location: McGill University

The ULaval infrastructure consists of a surface analysis laboratory (LAS) equipped with X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) along with an Auger electron spectroscopy (AES) and Ion scattering spectroscopy (ISS), a combined vibrational spectroscopy, XPS and desorption mass spectrometry systems for studying chemical reactions on surfaces (CFI), a scanning tunneling microscope, and a combinatorial system (SOPHAS CAT).

Location: Université Laval

The Concordia infrastructure includes a 400 MHz NMR instrument to support synthetic research.

The UdeS infrastructure includes 1 X-ray diffractometer (Enraf-Nonius CAD-4), 1 600 MHz NMR, 1 elemental analyzer (TruSPEC of LECO) and 3 mass spectrometers (3 GC/MS, 1 LC/MS and a VG Micromass ZAB-1F).

The UdeM infrastructure includes one molecule safety assessment system, the Omnical ultra-low temperature four injection superCRC reaction microcalorimeter.

The ULaval infrastructure includes X-ray Diffraction (XRD), Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry (GC-MS, LC-MS-MALDI-TOF) and NMR instruments. The individual items are a Bruker APEX II single crystal-CCD diffractometer with a Mo X-ray source; a LC-MS MALDI TOF (Agilent) and a GC-MS with an ion trap (Thermo); 300 and 400 MHz NMR instruments.

Location: Concordia University, Université de Sherbrooke, Université Laval, Université de Montréal