Photothermal Spectroscopy Corp (PSC; Santa Barbara, CA), a pioneer in optical photothermal infrared (O-PTIR) spectroscopy, and Bio-Rad Laboratories (NYSE: BIO; Hercules, CA), a provider of life science research and clinical diagnostic products, announced a partnership in which PSC will bundle Bio-Rad’s IR and Raman Library and Identification software with PSC’s instruments.
The partnership leverages the capabilities of both companies, offering customers a complementary and confirmatory dual-technique analysis that uses PSC’s O-PTIR technique. The O-PTIR technique offers simultaneous sub-micron measurement of IR and Raman spectra via their mIRage+R Infrared and Raman Microscope. Used with Bio-Rad’s KnowItAll software, the combination offers simultaneous searching of IR and Raman spectral databases for compound identification, providing researchers the ability to increase their efficiency, accuracy, and overall confidence in results.
As part of the agreement, PSC will bundle a one-year subscription to Bio-Rad’s KnowItAll IR/Raman Identification Pro, providing customers access to Bio-Rad’s entire IR and Raman libraries with every PSC instrument and the ability to identify spectra with patented tools and spectral reference data available only from Bio Rad.
“Ultimately, the critical aspect of identifying unknowns is having confidence in your selection as the best match,” said Mustafa Kansiz, director of product management. “Now, two complementary spectra, IR and Raman, collected simultaneously, can be used for that purpose with one confirming the other to give more accurate and confident identification. Hence, we describe the techniques as complementary and confirmatory.”
IR and Raman spectra of an unknown sample are measured from the same spot, at the same time with the same spatial resolution, on the PSC mIRage+R instrument, the world’s first simultaneous IR and Raman microscopy system. The instrument transfers the IR and Raman spectra of the unknown sample to Bio-Rad’s KnowItAll software for analysis. The software automatically performs a comparison of both spectra against the world’s largest spectral database of IR and Raman reference spectra using a unique, simultaneous multi-technique spectral search capability. The KnowItAll software quickly summarizes and presents the final results in a 2D scatter plot that clearly points to the best database matches from the dual technique comparisons.
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