Agilent Measurement Journal - Issue 3 - 2007 - (Page 3)

Examples of direct and indirect measurements abound in electronics. In the early days of computer technology, designers relied on oscilloscopes to view the squarewave ones and zeroes coursing through their designs. With too few channels and inadequate triggering, oscilloscopes made it difﬁcult to ﬁnd timing problems and dataﬂow bottlenecks — until the oscilloscope evolved into the multi-channel logic analyzer, which provides a more direct way to understand digital circuitry. In chemical analysis, octane number is an empirical measure of gasoline performance traditionally tested in a standard reference engine. Using techniques developed in the 1990s, chemists have identiﬁed mathematical correlations between octane number and gasoline’s near-infrared spectrum. As a result, the near-infrared spectrometer replaced the reference engine and we can make gasolineperformance measurements indirectly through near-infrared spectroscopy without the arduous process of identifying individual gasoline components and their concentrations. Life sciences bring another perspective, where reduction in sample complexity can be equivalent to increasing direct-detection performance. Up-front sample preparation is often overlooked as a core measurement component. For example, simpliﬁcation of a complex biological mixture through speciﬁc biochemical reactions — an indirect measurement — simpliﬁes the direct measurement task for instruments such as bioanalyzers and mass spectrometers. The key speciﬁcation then becomes the overall solution performance, which includes direct-measurement instrument performance as an important — but not necessarily deﬁning — contributor. At the nanoscale, atoms, molecules and structures play by the rules of atomic forces, molecular bonds and quantum mechanics. This is why observing, measuring and characterizing nanoscale materials will require clever combinations of existing instruments to make direct or indirect measurements until application-speciﬁc tools are available. For example, in the R&D environment, an atomic force microscope (AFM), which physically touches the sample as it scans its surface, can be used in conjunction with a network analyzer or impedance/materials analyzer for direct measurement. In such cases, the AFM’s scanning tip also serves as a probe that contacts the nanoscale device and enables electrical measurements of current, voltage, capacitance, magnetic force, impedance and even scattering or S-parameters. Ideally, within this decade we will begin to combine these separate modes of direct measurement into integrated and synchronous multimodal measurements. When nanoscale products move into manufacturing, sample characterization through direct physical measurements can be too cumbersome, costly and timeconsuming outside of the R&D environment. Instead, surrogate, ensemble and systemslevel measurements enable statistical characterization of a material’s functional properties, thereby conﬁrming its physical integrity. Once we understand the correlation of structure/function measurements, it may be far easier to indirectly measure functional stability than to physically probe structural integrity. These measurements are leading to new paradigms in data analysis and new methods for the correlation, visualization and integration of heterogeneous data sets. These “nano-informatics” tools are beginning to emerge and may leverage today’s bioinformatics solutions. Progress in nano-informatics will drive nanotechnology insight and facilitate its transition into production. In all of these disciplines, the transitions from research to development to manufacturing require ingenuity and innovation at two key times: when solving the indirect measurement problem and when creating a new instrument that can make the measurement directly. As you’ll see in this issue of Agilent Measurement Journal, we’re making progress in both areas. Agilent Measurement Journal 3 2

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Agilent Measurement Journal - Issue 3 - 2007

Applying Ingenuity to the Measurement of Emerging Technologies Contents Emerging Innovations Department Delivering Bigger Benefits by Optimizing Customer Workflows Measuring Material Properties at the Nanoscale Utilizing In Situ Atomic Force Microscopy in Life Science, Pharmaceutical and other Bio-Related Applications WiMAX™: Plotting a New Path to Global Mobility Addressing the Triple Complexity of Triple-Play Networks What Next for Mobile Telephony? Exploring the Inner Workings of Tire-Pressure Monitoring Systems Developing, Assessing and Applying a High-Resolution Thin-Film Magnetic Probe Making Accurate Settling-Time Measurements Using a Vector Network Analyzer Applying Metabolomics Methods to the Study of Bacterial Leaf Blight in Rice Plants Measuring Stream Dynamics with Fiber Optics survey

Agilent Measurement Journal - Issue 3 - 2007

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