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Mini-t Spectrometer

The mini-tau is an economically priced, ultra-compact system for measuring fluorescence lifetimes based on the technique of Time Correlated Single Photon Counting (TCSPC). The system uses the TCC900 computer plug-in card for fast data acquisition and can recover lifetimes from approximately 50picoseconds and 50microseconds. The system is an ideal tool for measuring fluorescence lifetime in research, quality assurance and teaching applications. Edinburgh Instruments have now launched a series of Laboratory Teaching Kits which utilise the mini-tau to instruct graduate and postgraduate students in the measurement and analysis of fluorescence lifetime kinetics. The kit introduces TCSPC as the method of choice for fluorescence lifetime measurements.

Click here for more information on the Laboratory Teaching kit

The mini-tau consists of the following hardware :

All inclusive package comprising measurements chamber with source and detector, PC and TCSPC plug-in board
Sub nano-second pulsed LED or picosecond diode laser (with choice of wavelength, see table 1 below for specifications of these sources),
integrated electronics with repetition rate up to 20 MHz
safety interlocked sample chamber with lens optics, attenuator filter holder and liquid cooled cuvette holder
Ultra fast, red sensitive single photon counting PMT, with optional Peltier cooled housing. Wavelength response 300-850nm
Optional manually adjustable Glan Thompson polarisation prism
T900 Windows application software for comprehensive data acquisition and analysis.

Software Interface :

The Mini-Tau spectrometer is supplied with the T900 software. This software is a user friendly package offering control of the hardware settings on the TCC900 data acquisition card together with measurement set-up and data.

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System Flexibilty :

Designed to be used with fixed wavelength, short pulsed excitation sources, the Mini-tau instrument can be flexibly configured with any number of these high repetition, excitation sources such that there are selectable wavelengths spanning the UV-Visible-NIR spectral region. Table 1 details the specification of some of these excitation sources.

Please contact us for more details.

Table1

Laser Diode & Pulsed LED Specification.

Picosecond Pulsed Light Sources

Model	Wavelength (±10nm) nm	Pulse Width ps	Peak Power Typical @10MHz mW	Peak Power Min @10MHz mW
EPL 375	375	80	90	70
EPL 405	405	85	350	200
EPL 445	440	100	65	55
EPL 475	475	90	100	80
EPL 635	635	95	140	100
EPL 650	650	90	120	80
EPL 670	670	90	75	55

A datasheet on these lasers can be found here

Pulsed Light Emitting Diodes

A variety of sub-nanosecond pulsed LED sources are available with wavelength from 270-360nm. Please contact Edinburgh Instruments for more details

Data Acquisition :

The Mini-tau utilises the technique of Time Correlated Single Photon Counting (TCSPC) for fluorescence lifetime data acquisition.

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