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The ActiPix™ D100 UV Area Imaging System

D100 UV Area Imaging Detector

The ActiPix™ D100 (part number ACTID100) is a powerful and highly versatile UV detector. The active pixel sensor technology at the heart of ActiPix™ D100 allows real-time detection and imaging, excellent signal-to-noise ratio and a wide dynamic range.

It can be used in a variety of environments, delivering the highest degree of applications flexibility from a single instrument. Cartridges are easily exchanged, allowing quick and rapid switchover between CE, capillary LC or nano-LC. In addition, the ActiPix™ can provide high sensitivity UV detection to any of these techniques when coupled to a mass spectrometer. These changes can take place in a matter of minutes, minimising system down time.

The groundbreaking area imaging capability of the ActiPix™ opens up a whole range of applications never before possible, including diffusion monitoring and real time monitoring of reactants and products (before and after single or multiple loops). Area imaging also allows multiplexing of capillaries, enabling high throughput for increased productivity.

The system comes with a complete library of standard applications such as capillary electrophoresis (CE) or capillary liquid chromatography (capLC) and is completely expandable for user specific needs such as lab-on-a-chip (LOAC) or diffusion or sizing.

Software and Interface

Paraytec’s software provides quick and easy access to information in a friendly Windows™ environment. Robust, reliable and intelligent, it allows scientists to be seamlessly guided through instrument configuration and data collection.

Reviewing data plots is easily handled off-line and exporting is available in convenient formats. Additionally, the software package has been designed for easy upgrade for future applications.

Imaging Innovation

Paraytec’s ActiPix™ technology introduces a new dimension to one of the most widely used techniques in analytical chemistry: ultra-violet (UV) absorbance detection. UV detection is used for the characterisation of a diverse range of liquid samples, including pharmaceutical and biopharmaceutical drugs, peptides, proteins and DNA.

Unique self-referencing

When light is shone through a liquid-filled vessel, such as a glass capillary, the liquid inside the capillary and the capillary vessel combine to act as a cylindrical lens. The white band surrounded by an area of shadow is the image obtained of the focused light. When no liquid is present, as demonstrated by the presence of an air bubble located in the middle of the capillary, there is no focusing effect.

When this vessel is placed above an area imaging array, the light in the centre of the capillary is readily referenced against light from the same source using pixels in the dimension transverse to the capillary. An active pixel sensor array is used in the ActiPix™ imager. This patented ‘self-referencing’ is what makes ActiPix™ technology unique.

High speed area imaging

A 9 mm x 7 mm active pixel sensor made up of 1280x1024 individual 7 µm pixels forms the basis for all our innovations. Active pixel sensors allows high speed detection across the entire imager area in real time with good signal-to-noise ratio and a wide dynamic range.

High sensitivity, high spatial resolution

A further significant feature of ActiPix™ technology is its real time signal processing algorithms. As an analyte travels through a vessel, such as a capillary, a series of individual snapshots are taken using the imaging array.

The signal processing algorithm determines the velocity and uses an appropriate time displacement to add together and average the snapshots. The analyte signals are correlated, whereas the noise is uncorrelated; the net result is a gain in signal-to-noise ratio proportional to the square root of the number of snapshots.

In other words, ActiPix™ technology enables increased sensitivity without sacrificing spatial resolution.