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How to Use This Plugin

This page covers common tasks you will perform with the nomad-inl-base ELN schemas. See the Tutorial for a guided walkthrough of a first experiment.

Managing shared entities

Creating a substrate

  1. Create a new entry → INL Substrate.
  2. Set Name (e.g. SLG-A01) and Material (defaults to SLG).
  3. Leave Geometry empty – a 25 × 25 × 1 mm RectangleCuboid is filled in automatically during normalization.
  4. Set Lab ID so the substrate can be found by ID in reference fields.

Creating a thin film and stack manually

If you want to create film/stack entries yourself rather than using the auto-creation toggle:

  1. Create a new entry → INL Thin Film. Set Material and Thickness.
  2. Create a new entry → INL Thin Film Stack.
  3. Add a Substrate sub-section pointing to your substrate.
  4. Add one or more Layers sub-sections pointing to thin-film entries.
  5. Normalization propagates the substrate dimensions to each film's geometry.

Wet deposition

Recording a deposition

All wet deposition entries (INLSpinCoating, INLSlotDieCoating, INLBladeCoating, INLInkjetPrinting, INLSprayPyrolysis, INLDipCoating, INLChemicalBathDeposition) share the same base fields:

Field Purpose
Operator Person who ran the process
Substrate Reference to an INLSubstrate entry
Solution One or more PrecursorSolution sub-sections
Atmosphere Glovebox / ambient conditions
Annealing Post-deposition anneal parameters
Creates new thin film Toggle to auto-create linked film + stack entries

Method-specific sections (e.g. SpinCoatingRecipeSteps for spin coating, SlotDieCoatingProperties for slot-die) appear in the corresponding entry type.

Using recipes

A WetDepositionRecipe stores a complete set of standard parameters that can be stamped onto a new deposition entry.

  1. Create a new entry → Wet Deposition Recipe.
  2. Fill in the desired Instrument, Atmosphere, Substrate, Solution, Annealing, and Quenching sub-sections.
  3. In a deposition entry, set Recipe to reference your recipe entry.
  4. Tick Apply recipe and save.

During normalization, each recipe field is copied into the deposition entry only if that field is currently empty (existing values are never overwritten). After one successful application the Apply recipe toggle resets to False.

STAR sputtering (SpuTtering for Advanced Research)

Recording a sputtering experiment

  1. Create a new entry → STAR RF Sputtering or STAR DC Sputtering.
  2. Set Name, Operator, Base pressure, and Samples.
  3. Add Steps – choose from pre-sputtering, stabilization, and sputtering step types. Each step takes duration, power/voltage/current, and gas flow.
  4. Add one Source per magnetron gun in use. Assign a SputteringTarget reference inside each SputteringSource.
  5. Tick Creates new thin film on any step to auto-generate the film/stack entries after normalization.

Substrate heating and rotation

All STAR step types (RF, DC, reactive DC, and Se annealing) expose four optional fields for each step:

Field Unit Description
Substrate set temperature °C Set-point temperature on the substrate heater
Rotation enabled bool Whether substrate rotation is active
Rotation speed rpm Target rotation speed
Rotation direction enum Clockwise or Counter-clockwise

Set these on any step where the substrate is heated or rotated during that particular phase.

Reactive DC sputtering (with pulsed selenium)

Use STAR DC Reactive Sputtering when a pulsed selenium environment is required simultaneously with metal sputtering (e.g. CIGS co-deposition).

  1. Create a new entry → STAR DC Reactive Sputtering.
  2. Fill in sources and standard DC parameters as usual.
  3. For each step that needs selenium, expand the Selenium Pulse Parameters sub-section (Selenium environment) and set:
Field Description
Selenium cell Reference to a Selenium Cell entity
Valve opening Valve aperture controlling Se flux (mm)
Time on / Time off Pulse duty cycle (s)
Cell temperature Effusion cell temperature (°C)
Cracker current / Cracker voltage Cracker supply parameters
Cracker power Auto-computed from current × voltage
Cracker power percentage % of maximum cracker power
Process time Total step duration for Se pulsing (min)
Total Se on time Auto-computed total selenium exposure (s)

!!! tip Cracker power and Total Se on time are filled automatically on normalization – no manual entry needed.

Selenization annealing

Use STAR Selenization Annealing to anneal a sample in a selenium atmosphere inside the STAR chamber without activating any sputtering targets.

  1. Create a new entry → STAR Selenization Annealing.
  2. Set Name, Operator, Base pressure, and Samples. The Sources field is hidden (not applicable).
  3. Add one or more Se Annealing Step sub-sections. Each step exposes the same Selenium Pulse Parameters as reactive DC steps, plus the substrate heating and rotation fields.

Selenium cell entity

Selenium Cell is a shared entity that tracks the state of a physical selenium effusion cell over time.

  1. Create a new entry → Selenium Cell (under the STAR category).
  2. Add a Weight Record for each time the cell is weighed:
  3. Weight (g)
  4. Measurement date
  5. Set Refill date when the cell is refilled.

Reference this entry from the Selenium cell field inside any INLSeleniumPulseParameters sub-section to link a process to the specific cell used.

Using sputtering recipes

A StarSputteringRecipe stores a reusable sequence of StarStep objects.

  1. Create a new entry → STAR Sputtering Recipe. Add steps.
  2. In a sputtering entry, set Recipe to reference the recipe.
  3. Tick Apply recipe and save. The recipe steps are copied to the experiment's step list (existing steps are preserved).

Target inventory

The SputteringTarget entry tracks cumulative usage of a physical target.

  1. Create a new entry → Sputtering Target.
  2. Fill in Name, Delivery date, Installation date, and Components (the target material composition).
  3. Set Calibration interval (time) and/or (energy) to enable automatic recalibration alerts.

Every time a sputtering experiment that references this target is normalized, a TargetDepositionRecord is appended to the target's Deposition records. The target's Total deposition time, Total deposition energy, and Time/Energy since last calibration are recomputed automatically. If any threshold is exceeded, Needs calibration is set to True.

Characterization

XRD measurement

  1. Upload a diffractogram file (.xrdml, .rasx, .brml, or .raw). An INLXRayDiffraction entry is created automatically by the parser.
  2. Open the entry, set Operator, and add a Samples reference pointing to the measured INLThinFilmStack.

UV-Vis transmission

  1. Upload a .asc UV-Vis file. An INLUVVisTransmission entry is created.
  2. Set Operator and add a Samples reference.

Cyclic voltammetry

  1. Upload a *mVs.xlsx file (e.g. sample_50mVs.xlsx) — the parser creates a PotentiostatMeasurement entry automatically.
  2. Set Area electrode if you want the plot to show current density instead of raw current.
  3. After normalization, a CV curve is displayed (scan 3 by default, scan 2 as fallback).

Chronoamperometry

  1. Upload a *ED.xlsx file (e.g. sample_ED.xlsx) — the parser creates a ChronoamperometryMeasurement entry automatically.
  2. Set Voltage applied and Area electrode as needed.
  3. The normalized entry displays a current (density) vs. time plot.

4-Point probe sheet resistance

  1. Upload a *4pp.xls or *4pp.xlsx file — the parser creates an INLFourPointProbe entry with the statistical summary and a spatial map.
  2. Open the entry to review individual INLFourPointProbeResults sub-sections.

KLA-Tencor profilometry

  1. Upload a *[Pp]rofile.pdf file — the parser creates an INLKLATencorProfiler entry with step height and roughness values.
  2. Each measurement site becomes an INLKLATencorProfilerResults sub-section.

External Quantum Efficiency (EQE)

  1. Upload a *eqe*.txt file (case-insensitive) — the parser creates an INLEQE entry with the EQE spectrum and extracted scalar parameters.
  2. Link a sample via the Samples reference field.

Solar cell IV

  1. Upload a *Results Table*.txt file (case-insensitive) — the parser creates an INLSolarCellIV entry with JV curves and parameter boxplots.
  2. The best-efficiency cell's JV curve is plotted automatically.

GDOES depth profile

  1. Upload a *gdoes*.txt file (case-insensitive) — the parser creates an INLGDOES entry with a per-element concentration vs. depth plot.

EDX/EDS spectrum

  1. Upload an EMSA/MAS text file (.txt, .msa, .emsa, or .ems) whose first few lines contain #FORMAT : EMSA — the parser creates an INLEDXSpectrum entry with a counts vs. energy plot.
  2. Acquisition metadata (beam energy, live time, stage position, etc.) is parsed from the EMSA header automatically.

SEM session

  1. Upload FEI/ThermoFisher TIFF files named YYMMDD - <name>.tif (the base image without a _NNN suffix) — all related images (YYMMDD - <name>_001.tif, _002.tif, …) are grouped into one INLSEMSession entry automatically.
  2. A gallery figure is generated with all images stacked vertically.
  3. Set Label on individual INLSEMImage sub-sections to annotate images.

Bruker AFM/KPFM/cAFM session

  1. Upload a Bruker NanoScope binary file with a numbered extension (e.g. sample.001, sample.002, …) — the parser creates an INLAFMSession entry automatically.
  2. The technique (AFM, KPFM, or cAFM) is detected from the channel names in the file and stored in the Technique field.
  3. Each image channel (Height Sensor, Amplitude, Surface Potential, etc.) becomes an INLAFMChannel sub-section, and a calibrated Plotly heatmap with µm axes is generated for every channel.

EIS (Electrochemical Impedance Spectroscopy)

  1. Upload a Bio-Logic .mpr file containing a PEIS or GEIS experiment — the parser creates an EISMeasurement entry automatically.

METEOR e-beam evaporation (Metal EvaporaTion by Electron-beam for SOlar Research)

The METEOR instrument (Korvus Technology) is an e-beam evaporator with four independent pockets and a QCM thickness monitor. Log files (.nbl) are parsed automatically on upload.

Uploading a log file

  1. Upload a *.nbl Korvus log file to your NOMAD upload.
  2. The parser creates a METEOR E-Beam Evaporation entry named <filename>.METEORDeposition automatically.
  3. All time-series data (elapsed time, chamber pressure, substrate temperature, e-beam power, rotation speed, per-pocket currents/power/flux, QCM frequency and rate) are imported. The log datetime is extracted from the file header.

Configuring the entry

After the parser run, open the created entry and fill in the following fields manually:

Field Description
Mask Description of the contact shadow mask (e.g. "shadow mask A, 2 mm circular contacts")
Samples Reference(s) to existing INLThinFilmStack sample entries
Substrate Reference to an INLSubstrate entry (used for new film creation if no sample is set)
Pockets → Material For each active pocket, type the material name (e.g. "Gold") to trigger a PubChem lookup
QCM Monitor → Thickness override Override the parser-read QCM thickness with a manually measured value (Å)

Auto-creating a thin film entry

  1. Set the Material on at least one METEORPocket (the first pocket with a material set is used).
  2. Ensure either Samples or Substrate is filled.
  3. Tick Creates new thin film and click Process (or save and re-normalize).

During normalization:

  • An INLThinFilm entry is created with the pocket material and the QCM thickness (Thickness override takes precedence over the parsed value).
  • An INLThinFilmStack entry is created, linking the film and substrate.
  • The Creates new thin film toggle resets to False automatically.

Understanding per-pocket data

Each of the four METEORPocket sub-sections contains:

Field Description
Pocket index 1–4
Material PureSubstanceSection (PubChem lookup)
Filament current Fil N(A) time series
Set power Target power (first Power N(W) column)
Measured power Actual power (second Power N(W) column, logged by Korvus)
Flux Ion flux (nA)
Enabled Shutter open/closed state per time point

Understanding QCM data

The METEORQCMMonitor sub-section captures:

Field Description
Frequency Crystal oscillation frequency (Hz)
Deposition rate Instantaneous rate (Å/s)
QCM thickness Final cumulative thickness from the last log row (Å)
Thickness override User value; takes precedence over QCM thickness for film creation
Density Material density in the QCM controller (g/cm³)
Tooling factor QCM tooling correction factor (%)
2. Fill in Area electrode, Electrode material, Electrolyte, and
Reference electrode as needed.
3. Nyquist and Bode plots are generated automatically on normalization.

Bio-Logic CV and IV (.mpr)

  1. Upload a Bio-Logic .mpr file containing a cyclic voltammetry or linear-sweep / IV experiment — the parser creates a PotentiostatMeasurement entry automatically.
  2. CV files (containing a cycle number column) display a current vs. voltage curve for scan 3 (or 2 as fallback).
  3. IV/LSV files (no cycle column) display a full current vs. voltage sweep.
  4. Set Area electrode to switch the y-axis to current density.

File naming for automatic parsing

Measurement type Required file name pattern Produces
Cyclic voltammetry (xlsx) *mVs.xlsx PotentiostatMeasurement
Chronoamperometry *ED.xlsx ChronoamperometryMeasurement
4-Point probe *4pp.xls or *4pp.xlsx INLFourPointProbe
KLA-Tencor profilometry *[Pp]rofile.pdf INLKLATencorProfiler
EQE *eqe*.txt (case-insensitive) INLEQE
Solar cell IV *Results Table*.txt (case-insensitive) INLSolarCellIV
GDOES *gdoes*.txt (case-insensitive) INLGDOES
SEM session YYMMDD - <name>.tif (base image, no _NNN suffix) INLSEMSession
EDX/EDS spectrum .txt/.msa/.emsa/.ems with #FORMAT : EMSA header INLEDXSpectrum
Bruker AFM/KPFM/cAFM *.001, *.002, … (numbered Bruker binary) INLAFMSession
EIS / CV / IV (Bio-Logic) *.mpr (technique auto-detected from data columns) EISMeasurement or PotentiostatMeasurement