CMM Service Announcement:
UQ/CMM readiness to Covid-19 impact
Dear clients, users and colleagues,
As the COVID-19 situation develops, UQ’s Centre for Microscopy and Microanalysis (CMM) has been engaged in various preparation initiatives, such as working from home if required and keeping essential services running, as per the UQ VC's email of Friday, 13 March.
CMM will continue to offer services on-site as long as we are under the operation mode: business as usual.
CMM is working with the wider university to ensure our infrastructure is accessible and functional should there be a requirement for us to close down in stages, or all work from home.
We are already prepared to offer services for the next levels of campus disruption scenarios (e.g. high levels of staff absent):
- CMM will operate with reduced staff on-site, which will allow essential research projects to keep running as well as enabling our clients to keep doing their work in the labs.
- If necessary, CMM will reduce to an essential research, government and community support mode, which will keep minimal staff on site and allow remote control operation, where possible, of the essential operating equipment. As we predominantly work with “materialised samples”, we are prepared to manipulate and load samples for those critical projects which researchers need to run. This will be similar to operating experiments at a beam line synchrotron facility.
- In addition, we are working with IT-Services and UQ/RCC to expand our virtual data processing environment, which will allow clients and researchers to get access to their data and process them under virtual desktops (CVL’s). We will keep you informed once these capabilities become available.
Subject to UQ's core network being available, users can have access to the different instruments as long as UQ allows for our staff being on site.
Unless otherwise stated in future updates and subject to the policy and decision making processes of UQ, CMM will endeavour to provide the best possible support services for essential and governmental work.
We encourage our community and users to make contact via cmm@uq.edu.au should you have any questions or concerns, or if you want to make us aware of your “essential research activity”, that requires CMM services or support during these times.
Professor Roger Wepf
Director, Centre for Microscopy & Microanalysis
