Keith Nelson Wins Bomem-Michelson Award
Keith Nelson of MIT has won the 2017 Bomem-Michelson Award. Nelson was presented with the award on Tuesday, March 7, at Pittcon in Chicago, Illinois.
Keith Nelson of MIT has won the 2017 Bomem-Michelson Award. Nelson was presented with the award on Tuesday, March 7, at Pittcon in Chicago, Illinois.
Nelson received his PhD from Stanford University (Stanford, California). He joined the faculty at MIT following postdoctoral work at UCLA (Los Angeles, California). Among his achievements is the work he did on the discovery of new light–matter interactions and their exploitation for spectroscopy and control of coherent acoustic waves, lattice and molecular vibrations, excitons, spins, and their admixtures with light. Additionally, he has developed novel methods for study of solid-state chemical reactions, crystals near phase transitions, glass-forming liquids, electronic excited-state dynamics, thermal transport, and matter far from equilibrium. Nelson has also pioneered tabletop generation of strong terahertz-frequency fields and nonlinear terahertz spectroscopy.
Applications of Micro X-Ray Fluorescence Spectroscopy in Food and Agricultural Products
January 25th 2025In recent years, advances in X-ray optics and detectors have enabled the commercialization of laboratory μXRF spectrometers with spot sizes of ~3 to 30 μm that are suitable for routine imaging of element localization, which was previously only available with scanning electron microscopy (SEM-EDS). This new technique opens a variety of new μXRF applications in the food and agricultural sciences, which have the potential to provide researchers with valuable data that can enhance food safety, improve product consistency, and refine our understanding of the mechanisms of elemental uptake and homeostasis in agricultural crops. This month’s column takes a more detailed look at some of those application areas.
The Big Review IV: Hydrocarbons
January 25th 2025In the fourth installment of our review of infrared spectral interpretation, we will discuss the spectroscopy of hydrocarbons. We will look at the stretching and bending vibrations of methyl (CH3) and methylene (CH2) groups, how to distinguish them, and how to know whether one or both of these functional groups are present in a sample. We will also discuss aromatic hydrocarbons, specifically the C-H stretching and bending peaks of mono- and disubstituted benzene rings, and how to distinguish them.
The Essentials of Analytical Spectroscopy: Theory and Applications
January 23rd 2025This excerpt from The Concise Handbook of Analytical Spectroscopy, which spans five volumes, serves as a comprehensive reference, detailing the theory, instrumentation, sampling methods, experimental design, and data analysis techniques for each spectroscopic region.
