Company Announcements

Nikon acquired a license from Harvard University for the right to use the Stochastic Optical Reconstruction Microscopy (STORM) technology.

Nikon licensed from the University of California, San Francisco, the rights for Structured Illumination Microscopy (SIM) technology.

For the year ended September 30, 2009, revenue for Carl Zeiss’s Microscopy Group rose 8% to €339 million ($458.1 million).

Veeco Instruments appointed David D. Glass CFO in January. Previously, he served as CFO of Rohm and Haas’s Electronic Materials division.

In February, DCG Systems, a supplier of semiconductor debug and characterization solutions, acquired Zyvex Instruments, a provider of nanoprobing characterization solutions for scanning electron microscopy. Randy Schussler will continue to serve as general manager.

Product Introductions

JPK Instruments AB launched the ForceRobot300 for single molecule force spectroscopy studies. It can be operated in a stand-alone mode or mounted on top of an inverted optical microscope.

JPK Instruments AB released the ECCell, which adds electrochemical capabilities to its NanoWizard Atomic Force Microscope (AFM) systems.

Agilent introduced the MLC400, a monolithic laser combiner system for confocal and fluorescence microscopy applications.

Veeco launched the MultiMode 8 High-Performance Scanning Probe Microscope, featuring ScanAsyst, which it calls the first AFM image-optimization scale mode, and PeakForce QNM for recording very fast force response curves at every single pixel in the image.

Nikon introduced the N-SIM microscope, claiming it has nearly double the resolution of conventional optical microscopes and a time resolution of 0.6 sec./frame. It enables total internal reflection fluorescence–SIM and the capability of optically sectioning specimens.

Nikon released the N-STORM microscope, claiming it has an order of magnitude better resolution than conventional optical microscopes. It reconstructs 2D or 3D fluorescence images from localization information.

EDAX, an AMETEK company, released the TEAM EDS analysis system for X-ray microanalysis, which is a suite of software designed to improve ease of use and flexibility.

Leica Microsystems, a Danaher company, released the TCS STED (stimulated emission depletion) CW (continuous wave) microscope, which combines the confocal TCS SP5 with optical super-resolution technology for scanning on the nanoscale, and is available as an upgrade.

Hitachi High-Technologies introduced the Tabletop Microscope TM3000, featuring 30,000x magnification, with a goal of initial annual shipments of 500 units.