Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Training is Back!

Training is back in budgets, at least that’s how it looks from my perspective. In my 17 years in business I have seen training budgets ebb and flow in sync with the economy. Spectros Associates training business has returned to pre-recession levels, and this may mean an overall economic upswing is in progress. I actually have more than one acquaintance, including my stock broker, who uses the level of my business as an economic indicator.

Training is often one of the first budget items cut during hard economic times. In reality, the time right after a recession has bottomed out is an excellent time to invest in training. With the turnover in the labor market in the last 12 months it is common at many companies for people to “inherit” the responsibility for running an FTIR. In fact, of the thousands of people I have trained over the last 17 years this is the most common story as to why they need training. These people frequently have little or no experience with FTIR and so cannot possibly do their jobs efficiently. A company can’t realize the efficiencies gained by reducing head count if the people left behind don’t know how to do the jobs of those let go. This is why training is so important now. Only by investing in the employees they still have will companies realize any increase in profit from this year’s job cutting.

Training also makes sense when money is tight because it saves money. For example, after hosting one of my onsite courses a lab learned how to change their FTIR sampling procedures and saved hundreds of hours of analysis time per month. Training can pay for itself in improved worker performance and fewer mistakes made. Remember, if putting out fires is a problem in your lab, training is your fire extinguisher!

Lastly, investing in training now will give you a leg up on your competitors. By being the first to spend money on training during this economic cycle you will realize the increase in analysis quality and efficiencies before your competitors do, who are probably waiting for a full economic recovery before unfreezing their training budgets. Your bottom will recover faster than your competitors as a result.

Spectros Associates FTIR courses can be delivered in public sessions (schedule here: http://www.spectros1.com/schedule.html), over the internet, or at as customized courses at your facility. Go to our website for more information on your training options: www.spectros1.com .

Monday, June 15, 2009

Mixture Analysis: The Importance of Reference Spectra

Mixture Analysis: The Importance of Reference Spectra

I’ve been struggling the last few weeks analyzing complex mixture samples sent to me by clients (performing FTIR sample analyses is part of my business…call for details). My challenges with these samples have me musing yet again on mixture analysis. As I teach in my Fundamentals of FTIR course, perhaps the biggest practical disadvantage of FTIR is mixtures. The problem is that the more molecules there are in a sample the more difficult it becomes to figure out what peaks are due to what molecules. FTIR is frequently sold as a great technique for identifying molecules in samples. It is-if the sample is pure or relatively simple in composition. However, my recent struggles with complex mixture spectra have shown me yet again the limitations of FTIR as a mixture analysis technique. My infrared spectral interpretation skills by themselves have not been enough to make any firm conclusions about the composition of these samples. I have found reference spectra to an invaluable aid in handling this type of problem.

By comparing the spectrum of your unknown mixture to spectra of known molecules you think are present, it is sometimes possible to identify the presence of molecules in a mixture. However, one needs to be careful. When comparing sample and reference spectra you can only conclude with 100% certainty if a molecule is present in a sample if all its peaks are present in the reference and the sample. Unfortunately, overlapping peaks and signal to noise problems can prevent you from clearly seeing all the peaks for a given molecule in a mixture spectrum. In these cases you have to find as many matching peaks as you can and use your judgment as to what to conclude. Frequently, phrases such as “suggest the presence of”, “are consistent with”, or “infer” should be used in these circumstances.

Serious consideration needs to be given to the reference spectrum to use. As I teach in my Infrared Spectral Interpretation course, when comparing sample and reference spectra it is a requirement that they be measured at the same resolution and important they be measured on the same instrument using the same sample preparation technique. You also need to consider the chemical matrix of the sample and reference. If, for example, the unknown is a solution of things dissolved in water it would be best to compare it to a water solution of the molecules suspected of being in the unknown. An appropriate reference spectrum gives you additional information along with your own interpretation of the spectrum when tackling mixture spectra.

Tuesday, June 2, 2009

The Little FTIR That Could

The Little FTIR That Could

I seem to have an obsession with pint-size FTIRs lately given my recent blog posts about handheld FTIRs. The folks at Bruker Optics (Billerica MA) were recently kind enough to loan me one of their Alpha FTIRs. It has by far the smallest footprint of any laboratory FTIR I have ever seen. According to the Bruker website the instrument’s footprint is about 8” by 11”; smaller than a lab notebook, and it is only 5” tall. The instrument contains a small version of Bruker’s “RockSolid™” interferometer. This design has two gold coated cube corner mirrors that straddle the beamsplitter and are attached to a single rocker arm. A flex pivot causes the arm to tilt alternately to the left and right to generate an optical path difference. My version of the instrument has an air cooled silicon carbide source and DTGS detector.

My understanding is that part of the reason they were able to make this FTIR so small is by getting rid of the He-Ne laser that has been such an important part of FTIRs for decades. This laser and its power supply, as you may know if you have ever looked inside of an FTIR, takes up a good bit of space. Instead, the Bruker Alpha has a small diode laser that gives off light at 11734 cm-1. This may seem sacrilegious to some spectroscopists, but remember we only need to know the wavenumber of the laser we use to measure the optical path difference of the interferometer. It does not matter all that much what wavenumber that laser gives off.

I am teaching my series of 5 public FTIR courses in the Philadelphia area this week (it’s not too late to attend, details here: http://www.spectros1.com/schedule.html ). When I teach these courses I always bring an FTIR with me, which is particularly important for the hands-on sample prep. course where students learn to prepare and run their own samples. My previous instrument was a “full sized” FTIR which worked fine but was cumbersome to move around and ship. It weighed over 40 lbs. and got damaged so frequently during shipping that I had a special padded case designed and built for it. The shipping costs for this were getting out of control, and had me wondering if there was not a smaller, lighter instrument I could find that would be easier and cheaper to ship.
The Bruker Alpha FTIR has solved this problem for me. The way I got it to Philadelphia was by wrapping it in bubble wrap, putting it in my suitcase, and bringing it with me. When I got to my destination I unwrapped the bubble wrap, plugged it in, and it is working fine. It did an excellent job today measuring spectra of a variety of samples in the FTIR sample prep. course. So my shipping costs are reduced from hundreds of dollars per seminar series to zero! For more information on the Alpha, click here: http://www.brukeroptics.com/alpha.html .