21
June 2024 ESRFnews
Rubis, a private measurement laboratory, breaks a record for throughput
on the ESRF’s flagship tomography beamline.
BM18, the ESRF’s 220 metre-long
flagship beamline for phase-contrast
tomography, has welcomed some very
grand samples since it opened to users
two years ago: entire human organs,
fossilised skulls, and most recently
a priceless violin (see News, p9). But
for some users, size is not everything.
Indeed, when the private measurement
laboratory Rubis Control came to the
beamline a few months ago, it had one
overriding goal: speed.
Based in Switzerland and France,
Rubis Control specialises in control,
measurement and programming
services for industrial clients. The
company was founded in 2015, and
has long had a close partnership
with the German optics and
optoelectronics manufacturer Zeiss.
With an in-house Zeiss Metrotom
3D X-ray scanner, it is able to perform
computed tomography (CT) for
a variety of purposes, including
porosity analysis, fibres analysis and
“part to CAD” analysis, whereby
manufactured parts are checked
against CAD models. Compared
with synchrotron CT, however, all
laboratory X-ray scanners are limited
in their resolution and – particularly
in this case – throughput.
For Rubis, this was an issue for a
client that manufactures veterinary
parts impregnated with antibiotics,
and contained within sterile
packaging. The client needed to
be sure that the parts coming off
a production line were consistent,
and did not contain any defects
Moreover they needed the parts
which were of high value to be tested
without receiving so much Xray
radiation that they were damaged in
the process The compliant parts
needed to be put back on the market
says Olivier Guiraud Rubiss chief
expert on tomography
Guiraud came to BM18 and
with the help of Elodie Boller
the ESRF liaison engineer for
industrial tomography and Paul
Tafforeau BM18 beamline scientist
devised an autonomous high
throughput experiment to scan
the veterinary parts each having
an area 290 mm x 47 mm and with
a resolution of 70 microns In
just 10 hours the team scanned
1038 samples The technical
characteristics of the BM18 beamline
are unique in the world far ahead
of those of conventional laboratory
equipment says Guiraud In
particular this is thanks to its field of
view its accessible energies and more
generally its modularity
Speed tomography
E S R F
The experiment was a success
and demonstrates the possibilities
for high throughput on the worlds
most advanced synchrotron Xray
CT beamline It has also continued
a longstanding relationship between
Rubis and the ESRF I have been
working personally with the ESRF
for many years says Guiraud Its
always a pleasure to come and do the
experiments with Elodie Boller and
Paul Tafforeau
Jon Cartwright
The ESRF’s BM18 has proven to demonstrate extreme speed in addition to extreme detail.
In just 10
hours the
team
scanned
1038
samples