Sometimes a scientist or laboratory manager has the opportunity to be involved in the design of a new building for housing sensitive instruments, such as electron microscopes. Unfortunately, few of us are trained in the necessary skills, and “learning the hard way”, by making mistakes, is not really satisfactory, given the expected lifetime of the resulting structure. It has to “right first time”!

Vibration, sound and electromagnetic interference are all huge unknowns, when it comes to microscope performance. Each manufacturer will provide you with a set of specifications which are “required” for their instrument to meet its guaranteed performance criteria.