The Centre for Advanced Photonics & Process Analysis (CAPPA) is delighted to announce today that it will be receiving €88,000 worth of funding to purchase a new visible hyperspectral-imaging camera as part of the Enterprise Ireland capital equipment call. Heather Humphries on June 4 2020 announced the €6 million investment in equipment from Enterprise Ireland. CAPPA was one of 37 successful applicants to receive funding out of 105 eligible applications totalling €6 million. The winners were selected through a rigorous evaluation process based on eligibility criteria for the call that included, but was not limited to, a strong track record of industry engagement, a significant industrial need for the new equipment, and space to service and maintain the equipment according to international standards.
Hyperspectral imaging is evolving as a robust, rapid, non-destructive tool for chemical imaging-based quality control and process development and monitoring. Problem focused solutions based on hyperspectral imaging are more cost-effective and robust in comparison to more advanced, sophisticated spectroscopic methods. Development of the optimum method requires a fully featured system initially, after which the method can be transferred to an affordable, less sophisticated, application-focused set up tailored to the customer.
Visible Near infrared Hyperspectral Imaging (400-1000nm) can be used for a wide variety of inspection tasks in agriculture, food processing, medical devices, bio-pharma, medical diagnostics and health care. The visible region is particularly suited to the coloured samples typically found in food and agriculture. Often large companies can lack the expertise in specifying a hyperspectral imaging system. There is often a requirement for method development with aspects such as lighting, spectral bandwidth and spatial resolution. CAPPA will operate as a test bed for different inspection possibilities, and be able to specify the simplest unit that would solve the customer’s problem. This new equipment will provide a modernised and broader offering to CAPPA’s service offering with increased range, specificity and flexibility and enable new offerings such as advanced analysis capabilities, process development, monitoring and optimisation, new product development, quality control and contamination analysis.
You can learn more about the current facilities at CAPPA here and see case studies of the work CAPPA conducted with industries across different sectors here.