Professor Keith Birkinshaw

Emeritus Professor
BSc, PhD (Leeds), CSci, CEng, CPhys, FInstP Photograph of Professor Keith Birkinshaw.

Contact

Email: kpi@aber.ac.uk
Phone: (0)1970 622 806
Fax: (0)1970 622 826

Teaching Areas

 

Research

My early research was the study of collisions between ions and molecules in gases. Many experimental techniques are used in this research and the performance is often limited by the detectors available. Therefore in the 1980s I began work to integrate an array of detectors on a silicon chip with industrial support.

The driving force behind the development of detector arrays is that they offer a very large increase in the collection efficiency of spatially dispersed electrons, ions etc. compared with a single detector. A high resolution array of detectors, each with its own 16 bit counter, requires a great deal of associated electronics. Integrated electronics enables much lower complexity, size and power consumption and we developed the first fully integrated 1D detector array at Aberystwyth.

At the conclusion of a recent SERC supported project (Real-Time Electron Energy Spectroscopy) an array of 768 detectors was produced on a silicon chip each detector having its own sensor, 16-bit counter, control logic and bus interface. The chip constitutes a complete detector system under computer control and requires both software and a fast interface. David Langstaff has been responsible for the design of the array since the award of the first EPSRC funding in 1990 and he is continuing the development of larger, higher performance arrays.

Biography

Educated at Barnsley Grammar School, Prof. Birkinshaw graduated from Leeds with a degree in Chemistry and a PhD in ion-molecular collisions. Taking research posts at University College London and Warwick, he travelled widely in the USA and Europe before coming to Aberystwyth in 1978, where he is now Professor in Physics. In recent years he has pioneered a unique microchip detector array for particle and ultra-violet spectrometry attracting major industrial and government funding as well as contracts from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena. With over 110 papers to his name, Professor Birkinshaw is also a keen gardener.

Additional Interests

Research Awards Since 1990

LINK Industrial measurement systems                              £1,073,246
SERC                                                                              £71,359
Higher Education Funding Council for Wales (HEFCW)   £20,000
College Research Fund (UWA)                                       £11,000
British Mass Spectrometry Society (BMSS)                     £1,500
College Research Fund (UWA)                                        £7,000
Joy Welch Educational Trust                                             £12,000
Daresbury Laboratory                                                      £4,000
Jet Propulsion Laboratory                                                 £37,000
EPSRC                                                                            £515,000
Joy Welch Educational Trust                                             £1,000
VG Scientific                                                                    £10,000
EPSRC                                                                            £30,000
HEED                                                                              £15,000

Staff Publications

  • J.W. Wells, Birkinshaw K., A matrix approach to resolution enhancement of XPS spectra by a modified maximum entropy method, Journal of electron spectroscopy and related phenomena, 37-43,152(2006)
  • Birkinshaw, K., Deconvolution of mass spectrum measurements made with a non-uniform detector array to give accurate ion intensities, Journal of Mass Spectrom. 206-210,38(2003)
  • Birkinshaw, K, Mass spectrum measurements using a one-dimensional focal plane detector, Internat. J.Mass Spectrom, 215, 195-209(2002)
  • Birkinshaw, K. Narayan, D.J., Langstaff, D.P. & Greaves, G. N., A detector array system on a single silicon chip - uniformity correction, SPIE Proceedings (Detectors for crystallography and diffraction studies at synchrotron sources), 58-65, 3774(1999)
  • Birkinshaw, K., Spectrum recovery from discrete detector arrays - correction for non-uniformity, Int. J. Mass Spectrom. Ion Proc., 159-165, 181(1998)
  • Birkinshaw, K., Spectrum measurement using discrete detector arrays, J. Mass Spectrom., 64-74. 33, (1998)
  • Sinha, M.P., Langstaff, D.P., Narayan, D.J. & Birkinshaw, K., Resolving power enhancement of a discrete detector (array) by single event detection, Int. J. Mass Spectrom. Ion Proc., 99-102, 176(1998)