Current Rates
Valid from 01.08.2023. Calculation based on 2019-2022
Atomic force microscopy
Hourly rate(Consumables): 1.29 CHF / h
Hourly rate(Scientific): 0
Cantilevers are provided at 10 CHF/session.
Factor: 4
Contact: Niklas Schwarz
Darkfield scattering
Hourly rate(Consumables): 0 CHF / h
Hourly rate(Scientific): 0 CHF / h
Factor: 2
Contact: Dimitri vanhecke
Leica LSM
Hourly rate(Consumables): 6.36 CHF / h
Hourly rate(Scientific): 7.32 CHF / h
Factor: 6
Training: 165 CHF per user.
Contact: Dimitri vanhecke
Zeiss Fluorescence Microscope
Hourly rate(Consumables): 6.36 CHF / h
Hourly rate(Scientific): 1.96 CHF / h
Factor: 4
Training: 135 CHF per user
Contact: Dimitri vanhecke
WITec Raman Microscope
Hourly rate(Consumables): 0.32 CHF / h
Hourly rate(Scientific): 6.10 CHF / h
Training: 268 CHF per user
Contact: Patricia Taladriz
Small Angle X-ray Scattering
Hourly rate(Consumables): 3.36 CHF / h
Hourly rate(Scientific): 9.86 CHF / h
Factor: 8
Contact: Sandor Balog
Dynamic Light Scattering
Hourly rate(Consumables): 1.01 CHF / h
Hourly rate(Scientific): 24.83 CHF / h
Factor: 8
Contact: Sandor Balog
Scanning electron microscope
Hourly rate(Consumables): 2.21 CHF / h
Hourly rate(Scientific): 16.09 CHF / h
Factor: 4
Training: 115 CHF per user.
Contact: Dimitri vanhecke
Focused ion beam
Hourly rate(Consumables): 16.33 CHF / h
Hourly rate(Scientific): 23.78 CHF / h
Factor: 10
Training: 700 CHF per user.
Contact: Dimitri vanhecke
Transmission electron microscope
Hourly rate(Consumables): 2.66 CHF / h
Hourly rate(Scientific): 25.26 CHF / h
Factor: 6
Training: 315 CHF per user.
Contact: Jorge Larios
Cryo transmission electron microscope
Hourly rate(Consumables): 2.66 CHF / h
Hourly rate(Scientific): 25.26 CHF / h
Factor: 12
Training: 450 CHF per user, TEM proficiency required.
Contact: Dimitri Vanhecke
Old rates
(calculation based on 2016-2019, valid until July 2023)
Atomic force microscopy
These are the old calculations! They are not valid anymore and are given here as a reference and to provide continuity
Hourly rate(Consumables): 2.00 CHF / h
Hourly rate(Scientific): 13.00 CHF / h
Factor: 4
Contact: Jozef Adamcik
Darkfield scattering
These are the old calculations! They are not valid anymore and are given here as a reference and to provide continuity
Hourly rate(Consumables): 3.06 CHF / h
Hourly rate(Scientific): 1.54 CHF / h
Factor: 2
Contact: Dimitri vanhecke
Dynamic Light Scattering
These are the old calculations! They are not valid anymore and are given here as a reference and to provide continuity
Hourly rate(Consumables): 0 CHF / h
Hourly rate(Scientific): 24.73 CHF / h
Factor: 8
Contact: Sandor Balog
Focused ion beam
These are the old calculations! They are not valid anymore and are given here as a reference and to provide continuity
Hourly rate(Consumables): 25.83 CHF / h
Hourly rate(Scientific): 12.23 CHF / h
Factor: 10
Training: 700 CHF per user.
Contact: Dimitri vanhecke
Leica LSM
These are the old calculations! They are not valid anymore and are given here as a reference and to provide continuity
Hourly rate(Consumables): 11 CHF / h
Hourly rate(Scientific): 19 CHF / h
Factor: 6
Training: 165 CHF per user.
Contact: Dimitri vanhecke
Zeiss LSM
These are the old calculations! They are not valid anymore and are given here as a reference and to provide continuity
Hourly rate(Consumables): 5.13 CHF / h
Hourly rate(Scientific): 2.79 CHF / h
Factor: 4
Training: 135 CHF per user.
Contact: Dimitri vanhecke
Small Angle X-ray Scattering
These are the old calculations! They are not valid anymore and are given here as a reference and to provide continuity
Hourly rate(Consumables): 0 CHF / h
Hourly rate(Scientific): 15.79 CHF / h
Factor: 8
Contact: Sandor Balog
Scanning electron microscope
These are the old calculations! They are not valid anymore and are given here as a reference and to provide continuity
Hourly rate(Consumables): 2.05 CHF / h
Hourly rate(Scientific): 18.34 CHF / h
Factor: 4
Training: 115 CHF per user.
Contact: Dimitri vanhecke
Transmission electron microscope
These are the old calculations! They are not valid anymore and are given here as a reference and to provide continuity
Hourly rate(Consumables): 0.74 CHF / h
Hourly rate(Scientific): 22.01 CHF / h
Factor: 6
Training: 315 CHF per user.
Contact: Dimitri Vanhecke
How are these costs calculated?
The hourly rates calculation are defined by the SNSF. Our costs only include the eligible costs.
Eligible costs
The eligible costs are the basis to calculate the hourly rate of an instrument for academic use. Practically, the hourly rate is based on scientific support and consumables.
Scientific support
The scientific support is all the support a user requires to measure his/her sample and get meaningful results for the project. It may support to the instrument, alignments of the instrument, support to design the experiments, sample preparation advice, help with the interpretation of the data or even performing experiments for the user. This support differs for every user, sample type, project and instrument. The concept to assign hourly rates to scientific support for microscopes is based on the observation that:
- Each user needs scientific support (e.g. for instrument calibrations).
- The amount of scientific support increases with the complexity of the instrument.
Since this differs from instrument to instrument, a Complexity Coefficient was introduced by the University of Zurich and has been accepted by the SNSF. The concept is also used in other UniFr facilities. Examples of the complexity coefficient for some instruments on the AMI booking platform:
| Instrument | Coefficient |
| Atomic force microscope | 4 |
| Scanning electron microscope | 4 |
| Zeiss laser scanning microscope | 4 |
| Transmission electron microscope | 6 |
| Focused ion beam | 8 |
These values are in accordance with other institutes, including the university of Zurich.
Consumables
Each purchase of consumable is logged to our consumables database. The costs of all consumables of an instrument is divided by the total hours the instrument is booked for scientific measurements. This yields the hourly consumables costs. Note: consumables bought by specific research groups (ie. not through the instrument specific account) are excluded from this calculation. The calculation integrates 3 years of consumables to avoid spikes in consumable costs.
Energy, chemicals, acquisitions and other eligible costs
These categories exists pro forma in the database, but are not included in the calculations.
- Energy is defined as the excess cost above normal energy use. This is not applicable for an instrument platform as AMI
- Chemicals are covered by the consumables
- Acquisitions: nothing additionally was acquired by an SNSF grant so far
- No other eligible costs were logged
Scientific support
Scientific support is based on administrator attention (A), which is a function of
- the average number of active users (over the last 3 years)
- The complexity factor of the instrument
The more active users, and the complexer the instrument, the higher the attention of the admin to (the prjects) at a specific instrument.
The attention is averaged over the booked hours (3 year average) and multiplied by the admin’s salary.
Consumables
Consumables are entered in a database and the hourly costs for consumables is calculated by the total consumable costs (3 year average), divided by the total annually booked hours for that instrument (3-year average).
Trainings
The cost for a training is calculated as cost of the session (duration, instrument cost, admin cost), divided by the average number of participants at a training.