Characterization of nanoparticles (NPs), including samples containing different sized NPs is described using ICP-MS. New integrated data analysis software is capable of quickly and automatically performing the complex calculations required for the analysis of single particles, while permitting simple, visual optimization and validation of results. The method provides a combination of particle size distribution and sample concentration information that is generally not available with other techniques.
Top content published this week include a feature article on a new innovation called the Personalized Optical Digital Twin (PODT), a recap of the International Conference on Raman Spectroscopy (ICORS) 2026 show, and a Q&A on measuring nanoparticle formation in indoor air.
In the final part of our conversation with Brandon Boor of Purdue University, he explains the respiratory deposition model his team used to analyze indoor particle exposure.
In the second part of our interview with Brandon Boor of Purdue University, he discusses how his team controls experimental variables during cleaning experiments in order to obtain interpretable data.
An upcoming interview with Ji-Xin Cheng, a Theodore Moustakas Distinguished Professor in Photonics and Optoelectronics at Boston University, will highlight his ongoing work in coherent Raman scattering microscopy.
The bulky bench-top NIR spectrometer is quietly being dismantled and rebuilt as a wafer-scale photonic chip, a self-calibrating algorithm, and a sensor small enough to ride in a shirt pocket. What once demanded a grating, a moving mirror, and a climate-controlled lab now fits inside a handheld module, a bioreactor probe, or a drone payload, and it increasingly figures out what it is looking at on its own.
In the first part of a multi-part Q&A, Brandon Boor, the Dr. Margery E. Hoffman Associate Professor in the Lyles School of Civil and Construction Engineering at Purdue University, describes the instrumentation and methodology behind measuring nanoparticle size distributions at the nanocluster scale (1–3 nm) and outlines the technical challenges of acquiring reliable, real-time data at these dimensions.
