In a separate ATP project, MicroFab is developing a microjet dispensing system that would allow faster, less expensive analysis of DNA for medical research and diagnostics, paternity testing, and other applications. A NIST computer model that compensates for a common source of error in coordinate measuring machines promises to increase greatly manufacturers' ability to check accurately the shape and dimensions of products. Such errors occur due to small variations in the performance of touch trigger probes depending on the angle that the probe approaches a part being measured. These probes consist of a sensing element and ruby-tipped stylus. Red to yellow areas show where the probe overestimated the sphere's true size.
Blue areas show where it underestimated it.
The SuperFit program maps these errors for a particular CMM and then compensates for them in measuring actual parts. Probe-lobing errors typically are reduced from more than 6 micrometers to less than 1 micrometer. Several U.S. CMM manufacturers are now evaluating the software. While the field of separation science has blossomed in academia, commercial successes have been harder to come by. Most current industrial separation processes require several passes of a mixture through a membrane or other filter and still only deliver low concentrations from dilute mixtures.