The Academy

Vacuum science, made to play with.

Short interactive lessons. No paywall, no sign-up. Pick your level and start where it fits.

  1. 01 The Mean Free Path How far a molecule travels before it collides. Drag pressure and temperature, watch the path grow and shrink. operatortechengineerresearch Open →
  2. 02 Why We Bake Heat drives gas off the walls. Why every clean vacuum starts hot. operatortech Open →
  3. 03 Reading a Spectrum What the peaks mean, on a real residual gas scan. operatortechengineer Open →
  4. 04 Pressure Signatures Air, water, oil, a leak. Learn the shapes pressure makes. operatortech Open →
  5. 05 Pumps & Conductance Why a bigger pump rarely solves the problem. techengineer Open →
  6. 06 The Quadrupole How a mass filter sorts molecules. Tune the fields, see what passes. engineerresearch Open →
  7. 07 The RGA Machine Inside a residual gas analyzer, part by part. techengineer Open →
  8. 08 Surface Science Physisorption, chemisorption, monolayers. What the walls are really doing. engineerresearch Open →
  9. 09 Leak Trainer Tell a real leak from outgassing. Practice on signatures. operatortech Open →
  10. 10 The FP14 Metric A hydrocarbon contamination index, explained. engineerresearch Open →
  11. 11 Bake Race Race two bakeouts. See what temperature and time really do. operatortech Open →
  12. 12 Troubleshooting The pressure is too high. Walk the decision tree. operatortechengineer Open →