Symbion Systems, a provider of analytical instrument control, analysis, and connectivity software, has introduced version 2.1 its of Symbion-LX software. The version adds a greatly expanded library of mathematical routines and a series of instrument control and data collection interfaces specifically tailored to the requirements of individual instruments.
Users of the software can click on the name of a particular instrument and the control/collect screen becomes a dedicated control panel for that instrument. The specifications for each control/collect screen are included in a software driver for the specified instrument. Drivers are currently available for many of the spectrometers widely used in process analytical technology (PAT) in such application areas as chemical and process development and on-line process analysis. Among these are drivers for instruments manufactured by Kaiser Optical Systems, Bruker Optics, Yokogawa Electric, ABB, Hamilton Sundstrand, and Axsun Technologies.
In common with the earlier versions of Symbion-LX, Version 2.1 provides a standardised platform for controlling a wide range of spectrometers and other analytical instruments. In addition, it provides comprehensive data manipulation and application development capabilities as well as the ability to communicate with numerous chemometric routines, other third-party programs, and enterprise-wide data systems. In short, Symbion-LX is a universal spectroscopic data system for use in such fields as LIMS, chemical development, and pharmaceutical process design and scale-up.
Symbion-LX, Version 2.1, is fully Windows compliant, with features such as the ability to integrate analytical data into reports written in Word or other Windows programs. At the same time, it provides a high degree of data and user interface standardisation while supporting all of the unique requirements of specific instruments. Finally, Version 2.1 provides the capability of storing data either as files or in a modern SQL database. The latter provides comprehensive search capability as well as ease of handoff of data to other software entities such as multivariate programs and data historians.
