An illumination unit is described that includes a first light source positioned on a first axis and a second light source on a second axis that intersects and is angularly offset with respect to the first axis. The illumination unit includes a reflector having an aperture through which the first axis extends and a reflective surface angled with respect to the first axis and second axis.

A cytometric mechanism includes: a flow path through which a cell suspension is made to flow; a liquid drive unit for sending the cell suspension which is in the flow path; and a computation unit for irradiating, with irradiation light from a light source, a cell suspension flowing through a flow cell, and for finding a cell survival rate in the cell suspension on the basis of a resulting forward scattered light intensity and transmittance and/or side scattered light intensity. The invention is provided with a calibration curve database for storing, in advance, respective calibration curves indicative of a relationship between viable cell concentration and forward scattered light intensity, a relationship between dead cell concentration and the transmittance, and a relationship between a cell survival rate and the side scattered light intensity.

Implementations disclosed describe an optical inspection device comprising a source of light to direct a light beam to a location on a surface of a wafer, the wafer being transported from a processing chamber, wherein the light beam is to generate, a reflected light, an optical sensor to collect a first data representative of a direction of the first reflected light, collect a second data representative of a plurality of values characterizing intensity of the reflected light at a corresponding one of a plurality of wavelengths, and a processing device, in communication with the optical sensor, to determine, using the first data, a position of the surface of the wafer; retrieve calibration data, and determine, using the position of the surface of the wafer, the second data, and the calibration data, a characteristic representative of a quality of the wafer.

An optical system of an optical analysis device is easily evaluated with high accuracy. There is provided a method of evaluating an optical analysis device including an optical system A capable of forming a confocal volume C at a focal position by condensing excitation light B, the method including the steps of: placing, at the focal position of the optical system A, a phantom sample in which two or more types of solid members having different fluorescent substance concentrations are arranged adjacent to each other; irradiating the phantom sample 1 with excitation light through the optical system A while relatively moving the confocal volume C formed by the optical system A and the phantom sample in an arrangement direction of the solid members; detecting fluorescent light generated in the solid members placed in the confocal volume C; and evaluating the optical system A based on the detected fluorescent light.

The present invention is a spectroscopic analyzer that when measuring the concentration of a predetermined component contained in sample gas in a reduced pressure state lower than atmospheric pressure, obtains the concentration of the predetermined component with accuracy. The spectroscopic analyzer is one that measures the absorbance of the predetermined component contained in the sample gas in a reduced pressure state lower than atmospheric pressure, and calculates the concentration of the predetermined component with use of a calibration curve indicating the relationship between the absorbance of the predetermined component and the concentration of the predetermined component and a relational expression between the pressure of the sample gas at the time of the measurement and the concentration of the predetermined component. In addition, in a graph with one axis as pressure axis and the other axis as concentration axis, the relational expression has an intersection point other than zero with the pressure axis.

A method for determining the concentration of a fluorescent and/or fluorescence-labeled analyte, and to a calibration method for preparing such determination, for use in the field of biological and environmental analysis in order to improve the accuracy of concentration determination, comprising the following steps: performing fluorescence measurements for calibration samples that have predetermined concentrations of a plurality of fluorescent and/or fluorescence-labeled reference analytes R.sub.j that differ from each other by values m of a diffusion measure characterizing the diffusion of the reference analyte, in order to determine the values i of a concentration-dependent parameter I; establishing functions F.sub.j(c)=i which describe the dependence of the parameter I on the concentration; determining the values of a slope parameter a for the respective reference analyte as a derivative of the respective function at c=0; determining the values m.sub.j of the diffusion measure for the reference analytes; establishing the dependence of the slope parameter a on the diffusion measure by a function E(m)=a; determining the value a.sub.sample specific to the analyte using the value m.sub.sample of the diffusion measure and the function E(m)=a; establishing an analyte-specific function F.sub.sample(c)=i; performing fluorescence measurements for the analyte and determining the concentration of the analyte using the value i of the concentration-dependent parameter I and the inverse function F.sup.−1.sub.sample(c).

An illumination unit is described that includes a first light source positioned on a first axis and a second light source on a second axis that intersects and is angularly offset with respect to the first axis. The illumination unit includes a reflector having an aperture through which the first axis extends and a reflective surface angled with respect to the first axis and second axis.

A surface plasmon resonance biosensor comprises: a prism, an incident light incident to a side of the prism and reflected at the side of the prism, the incident light comprising a first incident light having a first incident angle and a second incident light having a second incident angle, and a detector comprising pixels for detecting the incident light reflected at the side of the prism, where positions of pixels of the detector correspond to incident angles of the incident light, and where positions of pixels of the detector are calibrated by at least the first incident light having the first incident angle and the second incident light having the second incident angle.

An aquatic environment water parameter testing system and related methods and chemical indicator elements. The aquatic environment water parameter testing system includes an electronics portion having an optical reader element and a sample chamber portion having a chemical indicator element which may be removably connected. A chemical indicator element may include an information storage and communication element used, in part, to provide identification of a chemical indicator of the chemical indicator element. Conductivity and/or temperature may be utilized to calibrate readings by the optical reader element. A chemical indicator element may also include a thin film material having particular optical characteristics tied to the light from a light source, such as a light source of an optical reader element.

A method for obtaining a point-of-collection, selected quantitative indicia of an analyte on a test strip using a smartphone involves imaging a test strip on which a colorimetric reaction of a target sample has occurred due to test strip illumination by the smartphone. The smartphone includes a smartphone app and a smartphone accessory that provides an external environment-independent/internal light-free, imaging environment independent of the smartphone platform being used. The result can then be presented quantitatively or turned into a more consumer-friendly measurement (positive, negative, above average, etc.), displayed to the user, stored for later use, and communicated to a location where practitioners can provide additional review. Additionally, social media integration can allow for device results to be broadcast to specific audiences, to compare healthy living with others, to compete in health based games, create mappings, and other applications.