Miniaturized near-infrared instruments in dairy products or dairy industry: First steps in a long-distance race?

Near-infrared spectroscopy using benchtop instrumentation is widely used in the analysis of dairy products or in the dairy industry. In this paper, we review the use of miniaturized near-infrared instrumentation in dairy products or in the dairy industry, highlighting some strengths and limitations of current devices.

Handheld near-infrared spectrometers: Where are we heading?

During NIR 2019 conference, Gold Coast, Australia, a presentation upon a critical review of instrumentation and applications of handheld spectrometers was delivered during the plenary session held on Thursday morning, 19 September. Following the conference presentation, a vivid discussion flared up among the audience that equally involved academic scholars, industry representatives, as well as professionals who carry out every day in-the-field applications. Various aspects were raised connected with the emerged new generation of near-infrared instrumentation, with many individuals expressing their point-of-view on the merits and pitfalls of the miniaturized spectrometers. This vigorous dispute and exchange of impressions indicated that the community remains concerned about the applicability of such devices. That concern reflects the still relatively shallowly explored miniaturization versus performance factor, which can only be dismissed by focused feasibility studies with comparative analyses carried out on scientific-grade benchtop spectrometers. It is the aim of the present manuscript to summarize the discussed scientific content and to share the developed point-of-view with addition of our remarks.

Hand-held near-infrared spectrometers: State-of-the-art instrumentation and practical applications

Recently, miniaturization of Raman, mid-infrared and near-infrared spectrometers has made substantial progress, and marketing companies predict for this segment of instrumentation a significant growth rate within the next few years. This increase will be based on a more frequent implementation for industrial quality and process control and a wider adoption of spectrometers for in-the-field testing and onsite measurements. However, contrary to Raman and MIR spectroscopy, miniaturization has been much further driven for near-infrared instrumentation. Thus, the present communication will focus on hand-held near-infrared spectrometers only and discuss their applications to selected analytical problems.

Tracing the Evolution of Dust Obscured Star Formation and Accretion Back to the Reionisation Epoch withSPICA

Our current knowledge of star formation and accretion luminosity at high redshift (z> 3–4), as well as the possible connections between them, relies mostly on observations in the rest-frame ultraviolet, which are strongly affected by dust obscuration. Due to the lack of sensitivity of past and current infrared instrumentation, so far it has not been possible to get a glimpse into the early phases of the dust-obscured Universe. Among the next generation of infrared observatories,SPICA, observing in the 12–350 µm range, will be the only facility that can enable us to trace the evolution of the obscured star-formation rate and black-hole accretion rate densities over cosmic time, from the peak of their activity back to the reionisation epoch (i.e., 3 <z≲ 6–7), where its predecessors had severe limitations. Here, we discuss the potential of photometric surveys performed with theSPICAmid-infrared instrument, enabled by the very low level of impact of dust obscuration in a band centred at 34 µm. These unique unbiased photometric surveys thatSPICAwill perform will fully characterise the evolution of AGNs and star-forming galaxies after reionisation.