AIMsight infrared microscope

Shimadzu, one of the world leaders in analytical instrumentation and testing equipment, announces the release of the new AIMsight infrared microscope. AIMsight builds on the high sensitivity of Shimadzu’s well-known AIM-9000 to offer an improved operational experience through greater automation. AIMsight is intended for industrial applications in a variety of sectors, including drug manufacturing, materials science, electrical devices and electronics, machinery, transportation equipment, and for the environment.

Industry relies on infrared microscopes

An infrared microscope such as AIMsight is used by connecting it to a Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) spectrophotometer to measure micro-regions using the reflection and transmission of infrared light that cannot be measured by FTIR¹  units alone. The main applications of this are in the analysis and identification of micro-contaminants, such as those adhering to pharmaceutical pills, dirt on electronic circuit boards and microplastics.

Meeting new demands with new instruments

In 2016, Shimadzu introduced the AIM-9000, an infrared microscope equipped with excellent sensitivity and an automatic contaminant analysis function. Since then, the demand for measurements using infrared microscopes has grown rap-idly. At the same time – and partly as a result of this – the lack of analysts with experience in such measurements has also grown. The result is that there is now a very strong demand for highly sensitive instruments capable of quick, easy and trouble-free mea-surements of smaller targets. That’s where AIMsight²  comes in.

¹ AIMsight can be connected to three FTIR models: IRTracer-100, IRXross and IRAffinity-1S. It can-not be connected to the compact IRSpirit FTIR.
² AIMsight, IRTracer, IRXross, IRAffinity and IRSpirit are registered trademarks of the Shimadzu Corporation.

Automatic effects

AIMsight meets that demand. It easily – and, importantly, automatically – measures micro-targets by irradiating them with infrared rays and by then inves-tigating the reflectance and transmittance. It features easy determination of the measurement range via a wide-field camera as well as by automatic identifica-tion of measurement targets, automatic setting of measurement positions and automatic analysis via a contaminant analysis program.

Keeping you on the environmental cutting edge

Environmental concerns have also increased since 2016. To address those con-cerns, the AIMsight infrared microscope uses the new T2SL (type-II superlattice) detector. The T2SL does not use mercury or cadmium, which are restricted under the European Restriction of Hazardous Substances (RoHS) Directive for electron-ic and electrical equipment. The T2SL detector, a so-called quantum infrared de-tector, has been gaining favorable attention as a high-sensitivity, next-generation infrared sensor.

Not only is AIMsight a more environmentally friendly instrument to own and use, it also is an invaluable tool in trace-contaminant analysis and quality con-trol. Of particular note is the role it can play in researching microplastics, the tiny plastic particles that have such a negative impact on the environment. This is of interest in a variety of fields, ranging from chemistry and electrical and electronic devices to machinery and transportation equipment.

Additional AIMsight advantages

• Faster searches for measurement sites
  AIMsight is equipped with two optical systems. Shimadzu’s proprietary wide-field camera is not only capable of observations up to 10 × 13 mm in size, it also supports variable digital zooming up to a factor of 330 to a visual field as small as 30 × 40 µm.
  The two optical systems share position information, so the observation target being tracked is never lost. AIMsight includes a 330× digital zoom function, and micro-measurement targets are quickly found from the wide-field obser-vations. For inexperienced users, a function is provided that easily identifies the mea-surement target with a simple click on the image in the AMsolution control software and which automatically sets the optimal measurement po-sition in just one second.
• Highest sensitivity for micro-measurements
  AIMsight provides the highest sensitivity in its class, with a signal-to-noise ra-tio (S/N ratio) of 30,000:1. High-sensitivity data is quickly acquired even for micro-measurement targets as small as 10 µm. In addition, the length of tar-gets can be measured by selecting the start and end points in the image. A function is included to measure the diameter of microplastic particles.
• Automatic contaminant analysis program
  After the data is acquired, it can be analyzed automatically by a contaminant analysis program provided as standard with the LabSolutions IR FTIR control software. The contaminant database, which uses a proprietary Shimadzu al-gorithm, provides high-accuracy analysis results. Qualitative results can be obtained in seconds, with no additional work required by the analyst.
  Additionally, qualitative accuracy can be heightened by combining the pro-gram with Shimadzu’s own databases: the Contaminant Library, the Thermal-ly Degraded Plastics Library and the UV-Degraded Plastics Library.
   

Seeing clearly with Shimadzu

Whether addressing environmental concerns directly, helping industry to better do so or assisting instrumentation operators with greater ease through automa-tion, Shimadzu is diligently and continuously assessing the many challenges we face and working to provide solutions: such as AIMsight.

Web summary

Shimadzu, one of the world leaders in analytical instrumentation and testing equipment, announces the release of the AIMsight infrared microscope. AIM-sight builds on the high sensitivity of Shimadzu’s well-known AIM-9000 to offer an improved operational experience through greater automation. In addition to assisting labs in simplifying the workloads of their operators, AIMsight meets the latest in environmental regulatory demands and assists industry in its efforts to measure and reduce harmful contaminants such as microplastics.

Web link:  www.shimadzu.eu/minimal-traces

Figure 1: Shimadzu’s new AIMsight infrared microscope – connected to an IRXross Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) spectrophotometer