The Compact Line of integrated spectrochemical instruments is targeted at proof of concept and early-stage research and educational purposes. Each compact line instrument includes: Avantes Compact Line spectrometer, Avantes light source, peristaltic pump, a mount for a dedicated spectroelectrochemical cell (cuvette with post) and electrolyte reservoir that are fixed on a 30 cm x 45 cm solid aluminium optical board. The components are selected, and the design is optimised to ensure a small footprint, ease of use, good analytical performance and safety when operating under a laboratory fume hood.

Central to the system is an optical fibre coupled spectroelectrochemical cell selected from a variety of redox.me products (added separately). By using optical fibres terminated in collimating lenses both easy assembly and reproducible alignment are achieved.

Electrolyte is delivered to the cell from a reservoir via a peristaltic pump. The pump head has 1 channel and pumps the electrolyte at a flow rate between 0.07 up to 380 ml per minute via Silicone or Viton™/Fluran™ F-5500-A (aqueous electrolyte) or PharMed™ (organic electrolyte) internal tubing, and FEP tubing further on to the cell/reservoir. 

Spectrometric analyses are carried out via fibre coupled Avantes Compact Line spectrometer(s) and light source(s). Preconfigured integrated systems in the UV, Vis, NIR, Wide range UV-Vis and Dual Channel ‘extra wide’ UV-VIS-NIR regions are available. These preconfigured systems match light source, fibre optic, lenses and spectrometer configurations to deliver optimised performance within the specified spectral range and analytical application, but custom systems can be configured at extra cost to meet exacting end use requirements. Please contact redox.me for additional information about custom spectrometer and instrument configurations.

All light sources used in the integrated systems are equipped with TTL shutters or triggers to reduce light exposure of the sample to an absolute minimum. The sources are triggered by the same software as the spectrometer allowing for simple experiment design and synchronised measurements at user defined parameters and intervals. Through the use of TTL shutters and/or pulsed sources it is possible to both minimise undesirable thermal effects and ensure a stable light source to minimise drift.

The fibre optics are selected to minimise spectral absorption and optimise coupling of the light source and spectrometer thereby maximising the useable light delivered to the cell without saturating the spectrometer. This allows for faster integration times and increased signal averaging to improve the signal to noise ratio of the measurements.

The Compact Line systems are supplied with Avasoft Full version 8.11 plus the chemometrics extension for simple data acquisition and post processing as well as process monitoring and real-time calculation of analyte concentration. Additional Avantes software modules such as Thin Film analysis and colourimetry are available for other applications at an additional cost.

Application note
The Integrated Spectrochemical System Compact Wide (ISS Compact Wide) includes a AvaSpec-Mini2048CL-UVI25 spectrometer and an AvaLight-XE pulsed xenon lamp coupled to the electrochemical flow cell by Low OH SMA 905 terminated optical fibres. It provides sufficient resolution and sensitivity over a large range covering the UV-Vis and NIR spectral regions from 200 to 1100 nm. It is targeted at educational labs and proof of concept research where either the spectral region of interest is not known or high spectral resolution is not required.

The following cells are compatible with ISS Compact Wide (please select desired option and add it to the quotation separately):
Cell 1: SPECTRO-EFC, SMA 905, 1.75 mL
Cell 2: SPECTRO-EFC, 4 mm path, 0.7 mL, SMA 905 variant
Cell 3: R/T/A SPECTRO-EC, 1.75 mL, SMA 905 variant

The AvaLight-XE is a compact pulsed xenon light suitable for UV and Visible applications or for fluorescence spectroscopy of analytes in the electrolyte or at electrode surfaces. The 15 pin sub-D connector, TTL levels allows for communication to the Avantes compact line spectrometer and triggered control of pulse rate and duration.

The AvaSpec CompactLine spectrometers are compact and rugged spectrometers suitable for harsh environments. They deliver the resolution, sensitivity and stability that is expected from Avantes spectrometers in a form factor that is the size of a deck of cards. The AvaSpec-Mini2048CL-UVI25 is a multi-purpose instrument covering the UV through the Vis to the NIR region. When compared to either the Compact UV or Compact Vis, this configuration trades resolution for range, but its resolution of 1.3 nm over a 900 nm range (200 – 1100 nm) is sufficient for educational labs, early stage research or labs that routinely wish to probe this 900 nm range in a single instrument.