Publications

Is Your Software Developer Kit a Solution or a Problem?

This article illustrates how camera SDKs are used and discusses attributes one should seek in both an SDK and the support system implemented by its supplier.

It also introduces PCO’s approach to SDK fit and functionality.

Is it true that cooled cameras are more sensitive than non-cooled cameras?

Reduction of temperature via cooling of image sensor components or electronic circuits in devices can improve image quality and performance.
But are cooled cameras more sensitive? What are the pros and cons of cooled cameras?

Camera-Based Solutions For High-Content Imaging

This article seeks to help readers identify both their needs and their options when implementing a new camera into a high-content system, empowering individuals who evaluate and test new imaging technology to make informed decisions.

Improving Microscopy And Biological Imaging With Backside Illuminated (BI) sCMOS Sensors

With greater sensitivity, speed, resolution, and dynamic range, a shift to cameras with backside-illuminated sCMOS sensors can provide extensive benefits to researchers, all at prices similar to existing equipment.

OEMs: Expand Your Product Portfolio With sCMOS Sensors

OEMs can enhance their products with expanded capabilities and attract customers by incorporating scientific CMOS sensor technology.

Understanding Camera-Based Ultraviolet Imaging And Applications

A new generation of advanced UV imaging cameras has opened the door to new applications and enhanced performance in existing applications.

Everything you always wanted to know about sCMOS cameras....

...but were afraid to ask is the new e-book on our sCMOS sensor technology.  Whether it's pixel size, camera sensitivity, industry standards or data transfer, the e-book gives you answers on the most frequently asked questions about sCMOS technology on more than 50 pages.

To See Or Not To See...Can Non-Cooled sCMOS Cameras Do the Job?

In the years since their first appearance in 2010, scientific cameras based on scientific CMOS image sensors have had a large impact on numerous new technologies and methods in microscopy. Practically all camera based methods employing super resolution and nanoscopy have made use of the ideal combination, of low readout noise, high quantum efficiency and high frame rates associated with a very convenient pixel pitch of 6.5 µm, which fit perfectly to many microscope applications. 

First Clinical Applications on the Horizon for FLIM

From microscopy of ocular diseases to imaging in neurosurgery to tomography in patients with skin cancer and brain tumors, flurorescence lifetime imaging microscopy is the versatile partner that can be teamed with a host of the other imaging techniques to produce striking results.

Piezo Drives in the Real-Time Autofocus System

High-Speed microscopy for quality control.

Fluorescence Lifetime Imaging Made Easy

Fluorescence Lifetime Imaging Microscopy (FLIM), which measures the spatial distribution of the fluorescence decay, can be achieved either in the time or in the frequency domain. Each approach exhibits advantages and disadvantages, depending on the type of light detector and acquistiton method employed.

sCMOS Cameras Examine Movements of Pathogens

Look Closer

PCO has been developing high-performance scientific cameras for over 25 years. Gerhard Holst explains how its sCMOS image sensors are aiding scientific advancement

High-speed Microscopy

Scientific CMOS camera technology: A breeding ground for new microscopy techniques

In 2009 a new type of complimentary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) imagesensorwas developed by a a consortium of three companies: Fairchild Imaging (now a division of BAE Systems), Andor Technology and PCO [1]. At the time the partners decided to call the device a scientific CMOS (sCMOS for short) image sensor to make clear from the very beginning that the performance data of this new type of sensor would be very different from the usual standard CMOS image sensor. The combination of high sensitivity, low readout noise, high frame rate, high resolution and high dynarnic range did not exist before, not even within the commonly used cooled CCD and electron multiplying CCD cameras, which were widely available for microscopy.

Lifetime reloaded

Determination of fluorescence lifetime made easy. Lifetime or decay rate relates to the phenomenon of fluorescence. This process, photoluminescence, is widely utilized across many areas, for tagging cells and cell fragments in order to observe metabolic processes, for differentiating between reaction products or for the characterization of any parameters that induce a change in the fluorescence.

Lifetime reloaded (DE)

Fluoreszenzabklingzeiten mit weniger Aufwand bestimmen. Lifetime, Lebensdauer oder Abklingzeit sind Begriffe, die mit dem Phänomen der Fluoreszenz, der spontanen Emission von Licht kurz nach der Anregung des Materials, zu tun haben. Dieser Vorgang, die sogenannte Photolumineszenz, wird heutzutage in vielen Bereichen genutzt, um Zellen oder Zellbestandteile zu markieren, um Stoffwechselprozesse zu visualisieren, um Reaktionsprodukte zu differenzieren oder um mithilfe der Änderung der Lumineszenz andere Parameter wie zum Beispiel den Sauerstoffpartialdruck zu messen.

The Innovation of Images

An interview with the head of the research department of PCO.

25 years at the top

After a quarter century in the business, PCO is broadening its appeal beyond the research community.

Fluorescent Imaging of Optogenetic Pacemaker Cells for the Heart

Optogenetics uses light to stimulate geneitcally modified cells. Researchers at Stony Brook University plan to use these cells as optical cardiac pacemakers. A dedicated highspeed camera is being employed to monitor the work of the cells, providing relevant insight into the propagation patterns of the activation signal.

Bird's-eye view

The German Aerospace Center (DLR) has developed a camera that can take 3D  pictures of Earth. And it can do IT from a jet airplane traveling at very high speed.

3D at 2000 Hz at 300 km/h

High-Speed Video Analysis for Motorsport

Photo Finish

New digital cameras make image capture swifter and easier at Arnold Air Force Base ballistic range

Stereo Vision for Airbags

A new method allows for the creation of a 3D model of the airbag expansion process without the need for locally identifiable pattern codes

Scientific CMOS Camera

From Micro to Macro...

Noise in Imaging: the Good, the Bad, and the Right

For imaging applications, it's important to know what kind of noise you're dealing with.

Darkness on the Edge of Your Images

Large imaging sensors bring special challenges.

New options for better systems

10 questions and answers about the chances and consequences of the new EMVA 1288 standard for camera system characterization.

Imaging system enhances skin-cancer detection

Vision Systems Design article about a new diagnostic system called Dyaderm (Bicoam GmbH), which helps in skin-cancer detection.

CMOS cameras rise to speed challenge

Cameras based on CMOS image sensors are providing a new cost-effective way to
perform high-speed imaging. Gerhard Holst describes the latest technology on offer.

Development and Application of a MHz Frame Rate

The ability to capture the unsteady dynamics of high speed compressible flows requires the use of ultra fast imaging diagnostics.

Fast Camera Images of Flux Ropes During Plasma Relaxation

IEEE Transactions on Plasma Science - Images of visible light emission from flux ropes during plasma relaxation.

View to the future

CCD and CMOS sensors today and tomorrow

Analysis of visible light images

Review of Scientific Instruments - Analysis of visible light images from a fast-gated intensified charge coupled device camera during flux rope interaction and magnetic reconnection

Ophtalmoscope enters digital age

Opto & Laser Europe - article about the application of a color pixelfly camera system in a new digital opthalmoscope.

Electron Multiplication CCDs Offer a Flexible Solution

The technology advances signal amplification but has its own limitations.

Camera Memory

Allows rapid data transfer - new technology bypasses PC storage.

12 bit dynamics

Applications in machine vision. The once huge difference in speed or frame rate between digital 8 and 12-bit camera systems has now vanished due to continuous improvements in image  sensor manufacturing and microprocessors. What is left is simply a certain price difference and the question of whether 12- bit camera systems can be used for  machine vision and if so, the criteria defining these applications.

Imaging on a Gland Scale

BioPhotonics - Some results of a study of the neuroendocrine system done with various microscope techniques and using a sensicam qe camera system.

PLIF technique for fuel visualization in engines and its role in retrofit technology

Colorado State University (CSU) Engines and Energy Conversion Laboratory (EECL) - Planar Laser Induced Fluorescence (PLIF) for combustion analysis using a dicam pro for measurements.

Fluorescence Imaging advances fuel-injector design

Laser Focus World - Planar Laser-Induced Fluorescence (PLIF) is used to improve the fule injection of an engine. The images were recorded with a dicam pro.

Red enables cell membrane study

BioPhotonics - Cell membrane investigations by fluorescence microscopy using a sensicam qe for the recording of images.

Camera captures spheromak plasmas

Photonics Spectra - The fusion of plasmas in an experimental spheromak reactor were imaged using a dicam pro.

A novel method for instantaneous, quantitative measurement of molecular mixing in gaseous flows

Experiments in Fluids 2002, No.33 - Laser induced fluorescence measurements using fluorescence and phosphorescence recorded with a dicam pro.

Study of Magnetic Helicity Injection via Plasma Imaging using a High-Speed Digital Camera

California Institute of Technology - The evolution of a plasma generated by a novel panar coaxial gun is photographed using a hsfc pro, which captures eight time resolved images per discharge.

A Laboratory Plasma Experiment for Studying Magnetic Dynamics of Accretion Discs and Jets

Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society - An hsfc pro reveals images of the formation and helical instability of a collimated plasma, similar to MHD models of disc jets and also plasma detachment associated with spheromak formation.

Transparent oxygen optodes in environmental applications at fine scale as measured by luminescence l

Proc. SPIE Vol. 4576 - The article shows various applications with a modular luminescence lifetime imaging system (MOLLI) and 2D and 3D mapping of oxygen with corresponding optodes. The system is based on a sensicam sensimod.

Luminescence Lifetime Imaging with Transparent Oxygen Optodes

Sensors & Actuators B - Imaging of the 2D distribution od oxygen using planar oxygen optodes and a modular luminescence lifetime imaging system (MOLLI) based on a sensicam seensimod camera system.

High-Speed Cameras

Laser Focus World - Specialized techniques based on high-speed digital imaging allow analysis of instantaneous impacts.

Getting better flow-structure information

NASA Tech Briefs - Digital particle image velocimetry using a sensicam double shutter.

Smear in CCD sensors

Smear in CCD sensors.