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  • Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR)

    Signal to noise ratio (SNR) is defined as the relationship between the signal and the noise generated within a pixel. If the sample signal is weak in comparison to the noise associated, it can be difficult to detect.

  • New Scientific CMOS Cameras with Back-Illuminated Technology

    Low-light scientific cameras are behind many revolutionary discoveries, ranging from quantum imaging to astronomy. For more than five decades, CCD cameras and their variants — electron-multiplying CCD (EMCCD) and intensified CCD (ICCD) cameras

  • The Art and Science of Being Cool

    Many low-light imaging and spectroscopy applications rely on highly sensitive silicon- or InGaAs-based scientific detectors.

  • Introduction to X-ray Scattering

    When a sample is illuminated by x-rays, these incident x-rays can be deflected and scattered by the sample, producing complex patterns. Analysis of these patterns, their intensities as well as the angle of scatter (incident vs scattered x-rays), changes in polarization, wavelength, and/or energy, can reveal structural, elemental and atomic information about the sample, and are known as x-ray scattering techniques.

  • Introduction to X-ray Microscopy

    The ability to image smaller and smaller samples allows us to see the previously unseen and analyze even the smallest parts of the universe, from viruses to proteins and even the atomic structure of materials.

  • Fundamentals behind modern scientific cameras

    Scientific cameras are essential for taking images of scientific research to understand the phenomena surrounding us. A key aspect of scientific cameras is that they are quantitative, with each camera measuring the number of photons (light particles) which interact with the detector.

  • Camera Gain

    When a sensor detects a photon, photoelectrons are released within the pixel (for more information, see our fundamentals page). The number of photoelectrons is measured at the end of exposure and a digital number produced. This is called the analog-to-digital unit (ADU) or the ‘gray level’.

  • ICCD and emICCD Cameras: The Basics

    Intensified CCD (ICCD) cameras use a CCD sensor combined with an intensifier. They are optimal for low-light or single photon applications due to the electron multiplying component of the intensifier.

  • Control of Ultrafast Non-Linear Interactions in Materials and Plasmonic Nanostructures

    Research in the lab of Haim Suchowski generally centers around controlling ultrafast optical processes on the nanoscale. One of the labs main projects investigates the non-linear interaction of plasmonic nanostructures with ultrashort laser pulses with temporal width of 6-20fs.

  • Scientific CMOS (sCMOS) Cameras: The Basics

    Complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) sensors are a technology that has been around since the 1990s. Early CMOS cameras were competing with the more mature CCD technology, but over the 1990s and early 2000s CMOS sensor technology improved to the point where CCD technology was overtaken to become the sensor of choice for consumer digital cameras.

  • Measuring Fusion Plasmas Using Spectroscopy

    The fusion diagnostics and control group led by Ted Biewer at Oak Ridge National Laboratory specializes in measuring and monitoring properties of plasmas in fusion experiments. We talked to Drew Elliott, a scientist in the group: “What we do in our group is develop and operate diagnostics to better characterize a lot of these experiments.”

  • Real-Time Imaging of Singlet Oxygen via Microspectroscopy

    Molecular oxygen is one of the most important molecules in maintaining life as well as in mechanisms by which life is extinguished and materials destroyed.