The Optical Dating Facility

Luminescence dating is one of the most widely applied geochronological tools that enables archaeologists and geoscientists to place past events of interest on a timeline. This technique provides an estimate of the last time sediments were exposed to sunlight or heat. Specifically, optically stimulated luminescence dating (or optical dating) can be used to estimate the time of sediment deposition. The age range over which the method can be applied is from a few tens of years to several tens or hundreds of thousands of years.

The luminescence dating laboratory at the University of Wollongong was established by Professor Richard G. Roberts in 1999. The current facility, known as ‘The Optical Dating Facility’, was established in 2009 and led by Professor Zenobia Jacobs. Since 2024 the facility is directed by Professor Bo Li. The facility has been widely acknowledged to be the world’s premier facility (Science, 6 May 2011). The members of the facility have been working on projects at the cutting edge across both methodological developments that include disciplines such as radiation physics, mineralogy, geochemistry, genomics, sedimentology and statistics, and also applications across a broad range of disciplines, including the archaeological, biological and Earth Sciences. 

Technical Staff 

  • Dr Lili Yu (Earth & Analysis Facility Manager)
  • Dr Terry Lachlan (Senior Technical officer)
  • Ms Karnjamart  Puengpaisal (Technical Assistant)

The Optical Dating Facility has a floor space of ~120 square meters, with two fully-equipped labs dedicated to sample preparation and two labs for instrumental analysis.

The facility houses state-of-the-art equipment for measurement of both the luminescence signal and radioactivity of sediment samples. The instruments facilitated in the lab include: 

  • 7 x Risø TL/OSL readers, six of which are equipped with single-grain laser stimulation system for single-grain measurements. 
  • 1 x Freiberg Lexsyg Research TL/OSL reader, equipped with EMCCD camera and various stimulation light sources (Violet, Yellow, Green, Blue and Infrared) capable of conducting TL, OSL, IR-RF and IR-PL measurements.
  • 4 x Daybreak Thick-Source Alpha Counters
  • 2 x μDOSE systems 
  • 2 x GM-25-5 beta counters (DTU Nutech)
  • 2 x Mx10-particle camera (Timepix3 detector)
  • 1 x Dr Hohnle UVACUBE 400 Solar simulator
  • 3 x digiDART portable gamma spectrometers

See equipment photo gallery

The Optical Dating Facility offers Licensed Consultancy for dating Australian sediments based on optically-stimulated luminescence (OSL) dating. Please note that we do not accept dating request for samples collected from overseas.

The total price and turnaround time will be variable and depend on a number of factors, such as the nature and number of samples requested for dating, and how busy the facility is at any given point in time. Please contact osl-lc@uow.edu.au for a detailed guidance on the price and turnaround time.

Facility equipment

Contact our team


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