High Performance Spectrometers

The non-scanning, high performance spectrometers developed by P&P Optica are unique to the market today due to the use of the PPO Gel Gratings and transmission based design. The systems have minimal aberrations and high light throughput, making them ideal for low light level spectroscopy. The P&P Optica high performance spectrometers offer high dynamic range and high spectral resolution covering spectral ranges from 350 to 2500 nm.


High dynamic range can be achieved by using either a linear detector array with wide pixels or via vertical binning of a two-dimensional array; however, this can only be achieved in low aberration systems like those provided by P&P Optica, or at cost of decreased spectral resolution with other systems. The illustration below shows the improvement in dynamic range of a P&P Optica spectrometer when binning across 128 rows of a detector as compared to looking at just a single row of pixels. As can be seen, the dynamic range of the systems covers 5 orders of magnitude with acquisition time still at 100 ms.

 

 

 

Similarly, a spectrum of a spectral lamp obtained with P&P Optica high performance spectrometer also shows the benefits of using 2D detectors. Figures below show differences in spectral detail, noise level and dynamic range of images obtained from only single pixel, 128 pixels and 128 pixels averaged over 10 scans.

 

 





The P&P Optica spectrometers are designed with particular care to eliminate second order distortion of spectra which is common in many other spectrometers, an example of which is shown in the figure below. The elimination of second order is achieved by limiting the working spectral range of a system to 95% of an octave, and by application of specifically designed blocking filters.

 

  • Measure dynamically changing samples quickly to capture spectral information at different states.
  • Increase the dynamic range by several orders of magnitude over typical spectrometers to measure concentrations several orders of magnitude smaller.
  • Observe small concentration changes, detect small amounts of substance, or observe spectra from multiple sources at the same time.
  • Exactly match the design of the spectrometer to your specific experiment.
  • Simplify complex measurement systems with one high performance spectrometer.



Size 32cm L x 12cm W x 10 cm H
Weight typically <4 kg
F/number F/3
Spectral range (free of second order effects) 90-95% of an octave in the 350 nm to 2500 nm range
Spot diameter 19 µm @ 1000 nm in 25.4 x 9 mm2 area
Spectral resolution (0.024 mm wide pixels) 0.5 nm @ 400 nm and 2 nm @ 2000 nm
Linear dispersion 90%-95% of an octave per inch
Maximum detector size 25.4 x 12.7 mm
Dynamic range of a single 0.024 by 0.024 mm2 pixel > 3,000
Dynamic range, binning along 2 mm slit > 55,000 (detector dependent)
Dynamic range, binning along 8 mm slit > 300,000 (up to 1,000,000 with averaging over a number of measurements)