A fluid medium monitoring apparatus of the present invention comprises: a light source unit for irradiating light; a first collimator unit for collimating light irradiated from the light source unit; a flow cell unit in which a fluid medium flows and light is allowed to absorb the wavelength of the fluid medium while proceeding along the moving direction of the fluid medium; and a light detection unit for detecting the wavelength of the light passing through the flow cell unit.

The invention provides an apparatus and methods for label-free, chemical specific detection in flow for high throughput characterization of analytes in applications such as flow injection analysis, electrophoresis, and chromatography. A surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) flow detector capable of ultrasensitive optical detection on the millisecond time scale has been developed. The device employs hydrodynamic focusing to improve SERS detection in a flow channel where a sheath flow confines analyte molecules eluted from a capillary over a planar SERS-active substrate. Increased analyte interactions with the SERS substrate significantly improve detection sensitivity. Raman experiments at different sheath flow rates showed increased sensitivity compared with the modeling predictions, indicating increased adsorption. At low analyte concentrations, rapid analyte desorption is observed, enabling repeated and high-throughput SERS detection. The flow detector offers substantial advantages over conventional SERS-based assays such as minimal sample volumes and high detection efficiency.

A sensor system (1) for inspecting oil, which comprises a micromechanical cell (10) defining a cavity (12), the micromechanical cell (10) being configured for allowing the entrance of oil (5) within said cavity (12) and the outcome of oil (5) from said cavity (12) through respective inlet (11a) and outlet (11b). The sensor system (1) comprises inside said micromechanical cell (10): a first transparent protective means (13a) configured to isolate the inner part of said first member (101) from said oil (5); a second transparent protective means (13b) configured to isolate the inner part of said second member (102) from said oil (5); a light source (14) disposed in said first member (101) and configured to emit incoherent light towards said oil (5) disposed within said cavity (12); an opaque plate (16) disposed between said light source (14) and said first transparent protective means (13a), said plate (16) having a pin-hole (165) configured to permit the passage of illumination towards said oil (5), said pin-hole (165) being located at a first distance (z1) from a focussing plane (F) defined by said oil (5) in cavity (12); and an image sensor (17) disposed in said second member (102) situated on the opposite side of the space (12) with respect to said first member (102) and configured to capture a sequence of images of the oil disposed within said cavity (12), said image sensor (17) being located at a second distance (z2) from said focussing plane (F) defined by said oil (5) in cavity (12).

Systems and methods for uniquely identifying fluid-phase products by endowing them with fingerprints composed of dispersed colloidal particles, and by reading out those fingerprints on demand using Total Holographic Characterization. A library of chemically inert colloidal particles is developed that can be dispersed into soft materials, the stoichiometry of the mixture encoding user-specified information, including information about the host material. Encoded information then can be recovered by high-speed analysis of holographic microscopy images of the dispersed particles. Specifically, holograms of individual colloidal spheres are analyzed with predictions of the theory of light scattering to measure each sphere's radius and refractive index, thereby building up the distribution of particle properties one particle at a time. A complete analysis of a colloidal fingerprint requires several thousand single-particle holograms and can be completed in ten minutes.

Disclosed herein are devices, systems, and methods for sorting a particle based on a characteristic of a particle.

A turbidity sensor or an arrangement for optically measuring one or more physical, chemical and/or biological, process variables of a medium. The medium is located in a pipe. The arrangement includes a housing and the housing is embodied for securement in the pipe. The housing is embodied for accommodating at least one light source for sending light through a window region into the medium and at least one light receiver for receiving light through the window region from the medium. The light is scattered by the medium and the light intensity received by the light receiver is a measure for the physical, chemical and/or biological, process variable, characterized in that the light source is so arranged that the light propagates in the medium in the longitudinal direction of the pipe.

The present invention provides an online measuring method of particle (such as bubbles, droplets and solid particles) velocity in multiphase reactor. The method based on an online multiphase measuring instrument includes the following steps: (1) the online multiphase measuring instrument is placed into the multiphase reactor, and then a particle image produced by two or more exposures are obtained; (2) the actual size of individual pixel in the particle image is determined; (3) valid particles are determined in the depth of field; (4) then the centroid coordinates are conversed to the actual length of the coordinates (x.sub.t,i, y.sub.t,i) and (x.sub.t+Δt,i, y.sub.t+Δt,i) using the actual size of individual pixel. Thus, the instantaneous velocity of particles can be calculated by

[00001]$V_i=\sqrt{\frac{{\left(x_{t+\Delta .Math..Math.t,i}-x_{t,i}\right)}^2+{\left(y_{t+\Delta .Math..Math.t,i}-y_{t,i}\right)}^2}{\Delta .Math..Math.t}}.$

The method can realize real-time measurement of the velocity distribution of bubbles, droplets or solid particles in a multiphase reactor, and the measurement accuracy is high.

An online multiphase measuring method of concentration and diameter distribution of dispersed phase particles in a multiphase reactor is provided in the present invention. The method is based on an online multiphase measuring instrument. The method described herein includes the following steps: (1) the online multiphase measuring instrument is placed in a multiphase system, and an image of the particles in the multiphase system is obtained; (2) valid particles are determined as: the particle that its Grad(Φ) is greater than or equal to Grad(Φ.sub.l/2) is labeled as a valid one; (3) the particle diameter is calculated by d.sub.i=10×n.sub.i/N.sub.10; according to the equation

[00001]$\alpha =\frac{V_c}{V}=\frac{\underset{i}{\overset{n}{.Math.}}.Math.\frac{1}{6}.Math.\pi .Math..Math.d_i^3}{S\times l},$

the concentration of the valid particles is calculated. The concentration and diameter of bubbles, droplets or solid particles can be obtained in real time and online measurement. The accuracy of this method is high.

A centrifugal field-flow fractionation device capable of improving analysis performance and shortening analysis time is provided. A first channel 111 communicating with a channel member is formed on a rotational shaft 11 that rotates together with a rotor. A second channel 644 communicating with the first channel 111 is formed on a fixing portion 60 fixed in a state of facing the rotational shaft 11 along a rotational axis L. A mechanical seal 66 having a pair of seal rings 661 and 662 that come into contact with each other and a biasing member 663 is provided to attach one seal ring 661 to the rotational shaft 11 and the other seal ring 662 to the fixing portion 60. The biasing member 663 biases the pair of seal rings 661 and 662 in a direction in which the pair of seal rings come in contact with each other. Since the rotational shaft 11 can be rotated at a high speed and the liquid sample can be fed at a high pressure, the analysis performance can be improved and the analysis time can be shortened.

A method for processing a substrate by using fluid flowing through a particle detector is provided. The particle detector is utilized to detect nano-particles contained in fluid. The particle detector includes a substrate and a pair of sensing electrodes disposed on the substrate. The substrate includes nano-pores, wherein the pore size of the nano-pores is greater than the particle size of the nano-particles, allowing the nano-particles contained in the fluid passing through the nano-pores. The pair of sensing electrodes are positioned adjacent to at least one of the nano-pores.