Oceanography is not necessarily a field that you would associate with breakthroughs in instrumentation for a subject like particle analysis.
FlowCAM, from Meritics, is such a tool, however, and it was originally developed to study organisms and solids in seawater.
Now, it has been applied to areas as diverse as pharmaceuticals, foods, beverages and within the petroleum-related industries.
Particle size and morphological information, in both dry samples and liquids, has become vital for addressing problems in powder flow such as compactness, flowability and separation, and how they affect product consistency.
FlowCAM is an integrated system for rapidly analysing particles in a fluid. With it you can obtain measurements that previously required multiple instrument types.
It combines the high-speed automated capabilities of a particle analyser with all of the information that can be obtained from microscopic images.
By obtaining and storing a digital image of each detected particle in a sample, and using powerful pattern recognition algorithms, FlowCAM can go beyond simple particle size measurements to automatically identify, differentiate and quantify different particle types in a heterogeneous sample.
FlowCAM will actually analyse thousands of particles or cells from captured images in seconds, automatically calculating concentration values along with the size and shape of each particle.
Everything is captured and stored in a highly efficient manner for easy retrieval, further analysis and archiving.
The FlowCAM is, in effect, a flow cytometer and a digital-imaging microscope - combining these two functions in the same instrument for the first time.
Meanwhile, the original FlowCAM is now also available in a convenient travel size.
The Portable FlowCAM comes in a rugged, water-resistant housing and is easy to set-up and use, operating on either 120/240 volt or 12-volt battery power.
It is capable of analysing particles (and organisms) using over 20 different image parameters and processing and analysing large samples at rates up to 10 ml/min.
