All of the JWST systems-level cryogenic vacuum tests were performed at the NASA Johnson Space Center’s (JSC) Chamber-A. It is now the largest high-vacuum, cryogenic-optical test chamber in the world, and made famous for testing the space capsules for NASA's Apollo mission, with and without the mission crew. It is 55 feet (16.8 meters) in diameter by 90 feet (27.4 meters) tall. The door weighs 40 tons and is opened and closed hydraulically. The air in the chamber weighs 25 tons, when all the air is removed the mass left inside will be the equivalent of half of a staple.

Diagram of the Cyrogenic Chamber in which the JWST was tested for space.

For three years, NASA JSC engineers built and remodeled the chambers interior for the temperature needed to test the James Webb Space Telescope. Chamber A was retrofitted with the helium shroud, inboard of the existing liquid-nitrogen shroud and is capable of dropping the chambers temperature farther down than ever, which is 11 degrees above absolute zero (11 Kelvin, -439.9 Fahrenheit or -262.1 Celsius).

A key addition to Chamber A was the addition of a set of six custom Minus K negative-stiffness vibration isolators. The Minus K passive isolators do not require air and offer better isolation than air and active isolation systems. A major factor in the selection of the of the vibration isolators was that they not only isolate vibration vertically, but also horizontally at less than 1 Hz.

JWST was designed to work in space where the disturbances are highly controlled and only come from the spacecraft, while on Earth with all the ground-based disturbances, such as the pumps and motors, and even traffic driving by can affect the testing. The Minus K vibration isolators provided dynamic isolation from external vibration sources to create a near flight-like disturbance environment.

The isolators utilize Minus K's patented Thermal Responsive Element (TRE) compensator device, a passive mechanical device, requiring no air or electricity just like the isolators. The TRE compensator adjusted the isolators as the temperature changes throughout the testing at JSC, keeping the JWST in the proper position.

The Critical Design Review for Spacecraft-to-Optical Telescope Element vibration isolation system was completed one month earlier than scheduled at the end of 2011. The six Minus K negative-stiffness vibration isolators were installed on top of Johnson Space Centers Thermal Vacuum Chamber A in March 2014.

JWST needed a support structure inside the vacuum chamber to hold equipment for the testing. Engineers installed a massive steel platform suspended from the six vibration isolators via steel rods about 60 feet long (18.2 meters) each and about 1.5 inches (or 38.1 mm) in diameter, to hold the telescope and key pieces of test equipment. The sophisticated optical telescope test equipment included an interferometer, auto-collimating flat mirrors, and a system of photogrammetry precision surveying cameras in precise relative alignment inside the chamber while isolated from any sources of vibration, such as the flow of nitrogen and helium inside the shroud plumbing and the rhythmic pulsing of vacuum pumps.

Minus K's Involvement continued...

-How much farther can JWST see than the Hubble?
-Why was it launched from near the equator?
-How cold does the JWST get in space?
-How did origami play into the trip?
-Why 24-karat gold on the mirrors?

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Minus K Technology Opens

Minus K Technology opens for business in
February 1993

Minus K's original SM-1 patented Negative-Stiffness passive vibration isolator. This was the first commercialy available vibration isolator offering 0.5 Hz natural frequencies for both vertically and horizontally. This was accomplished without the use of air compressors, computer componets or electricity.

The isolator could be used alone, or in conjunction with other units, and could be engineered directly into a system.

Original SM-1 Vibration Isolator

Within Saint Louis University’s (SLU) Department of Physics, research has been ongoing in the development of novel techniques for synthesis, characterization and measurement of low dimensional (1D and 2D) systems. This is in hopes to better understand how size, geometry or interfacing various materials and nanostructures influences the properties of the resulting systems.

Nanolithography Research
Nanolithography in general terms is concerned with the study and application of fabricating nanometer-scale structures, meaning patterns with at least one lateral dimension between 1 and 100 nm. A prime focus is very largescale integration (VLSI) and ultralarge-scale integration (ULSI) technology of nanoelectromechanical (NEMS) systems, and the need for better atomic-scale understanding of issues arising from the miniaturization of silicon devices. Under the direction of Dr. Irma Kuljanishvili, who heads up SLUs nanomaterials and nanofabrication research lab, the groups focus is on This approach is similar to a technique known as dip pen nanolithography.

In this technique, AFM tips or sharp needles can be employed to transfer small, femtoliter volumes of molecular solutions, or other liquid-based ink, to predefined locations on the surface of samples.

Carbon nanotubes, grapheme and other atomically monolayered materials are being considered as prime candidates for nanoscale science and technology applications, due to their unique and superior combination of electrical, thermal, optical and mechanical properties, says Kuljanishvili.

SLU's Negative-Stiffness Vibration Isolation System

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Notice that between points A and B, displacement is increasing while force is decreasing. Thus, the structure’s stiffness is negative in that region.

Negative-stiffness vibration isolators consist of a horizontal isolator and a vertical isolator connected in series. To counter motions that involve rotation (pitch and roll), a tilt motion pad can also be connected in series with the horizontal and vertical isolators.

The horizontal isolator consists of two fixed-free vertical beams (columns) supporting a weight. The weight imparts both eccentric (off-axis) axial compressive load and a transverse bending load. This phenomenon is referred to as the beam-column effect and causes the lateral bending stiffness of the beams to decrease. In effect, the isolator is acting as a horizontal spring with a negative-stiffness mechanism.

The horizontal isolator is designed to take advantage of the beam-column effect, allowing it to act like a negative-stiffness mechanism.

Vertical motion is addressed using two horizontal flexures loaded in compression, which form a negative-stiffness mechanism. The flexures are supported at their outer ends and connected to a stiff spring at their inner ends. The stiffness of the isolator is determined by the design of the flexures and by their compressive load.

Two flexures, fixed at their outer ends and connected to a spring at their inner ends, form a negative-stiffness mechanism that isolates equipment from vertical motion due to vibrations.

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Close-up of a stylus and LP record vinyl grooves

"Vinyl remains unsurpassed for reproducing music,” said Mark Döhmann, Founder of Döhmann Audio. To convey vinyls rich, nuanced potential a turntable must have precise speed control and operate without producing mechanical or electronic noise. The goal is an uncompromised signal emerging from a silent background, resulting from precisely designed construction that eliminates noise and gives precision speed control for ideal playback.

This goal has been very closely approximated with the release of the Helix One and Helix Two turntables, representing a breakthrough in analog playback design and execution. These turntables are a showcase for micro-signal architecture, a new way of thinking borne from the world of ultra-precision sub-atomic research, where the removal of unwanted vibration is critical to achieving precision results.

The Helix One and Helix Two turntables reward the listener with the closest facsimile to master tape yet realized. Their specifications demand the ultimate in noise suppression and vibration isolation systems, allowing the turntables and pick-up arms to deliver the micro-signals buried in the vinyl grooves of LPs.

Every aspect of the turntables' design requires the preservation of the micro-signals found in the grooves of the LP to be retrieved with as little modification and distortion as physically and electronically possible, added Döhmann. The turntables incorporate a number of engineering advances to deliver the lowest resonance profile for any pickup arm and LP combination.

These engineering advances include: a) mechanical crossover technology; b) a tri-modal platter system; c) an edge-damping ring; d) a tone arm damping system; e) resonance-tuned suspension; f) a diamond-like coating, amorphous material-bearing friction modifier; g) high-torque, adjustable-drive speed selections; and h) a velocity adjustment lock.

But what contributes to making the Helix One and Helix Two turntables truly unique is their highly precise, fully-integrated vibration isolation system.

The Need For Vibration Isolation
Vibration isolation in the playback process of high-end audio systems is crucial. Any external vibration, no matter how slight, even someone walking near the turntable or vibration from floor-mounted speakers, is sensed by the turntables stylus and affects the sound being played back from the record. Capacitors, resistors, transistors, tube amplifiers and other electronic components are likewise sensitive to vibration.

Analog audio is a very detailed and information rich storage and retrieval mechanism, continued Döhmann. The enemy of retrieval information is vibration, which can modulate with the needle as it works its way through the groove. If you can remove exterior vibration and allow the needle to operate in an optimally quiet method or platform, then you will get more information out because your noise is much lower.

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More at our Audio & Turntable Vibration Isolation Applications page...

(2016 Legacy Article) The tunable microwave-frequency alternating current scanning tunneling microscope (ACSTM) has opened the possibility of recording local spectra and local chemical information on insulator surfaces, much like the conventional scanning tunneling microscope (STM) has done for metals and semiconductors..

Spectroscopy in the microwave frequency range enables unrealizable measurements on conducting substrates, such as the rotational spectroscopy of a single adsorbed molecule. Developed in the early 1990s by Professor Paul Weiss, the nano-pioneering Director of the Weiss Group, a nanotechnology research unit of UCLAs California NanoSystems Institute, the ACSTMs single-molecule measurement techniques have illuminated unprecedented details of chemical behavior, including observations of the motion of a single molecule on a surface, and even the vibration of a single bond within a molecule. Such measurements are critical to understanding entities ranging from single atoms to the most complex protein assemblies.We use molecular design, tailored syntheses, intermolecular interactions and selective chemistry to direct molecules into desired positions to create nanostructures, to connect functional molecules to the outside world, and to serve as test structures for measuring single or bundled molecules, said David McMillan, Lead Technician at the Weiss Group.

Critical to understanding these variations has been developing the means to make tens- to hundreds-of-thousands of independent single-molecule measurements in order to develop sufficiently significant statistical distributions, while retaining the heterogeneity inherent in the measurements.

Vibration isolation
To achieve these nano-level chemical and spectroscopic data sets, the ACSTM must be positioned in an ultra-stable operating environment, one free of low-frequency vibrations.The lab was using almost exclusively optical tables on pneumatic isolation, said McMillan.One of our big problems has been space constraint. We needed smaller pneumatic optical tables to fit. But as the air tables get smaller, their vibration isolation performance diminishes.

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The compound microscope has evolved from an instrument providing simple contrast viewing, into super-resolution systems capable of sub-diffraction accuracy. Its two platforms, upright and inverted, can be found in most laboratories doing cellular research, such as in biotech and pharmaceutical. Upright microscopes are used for viewing glass slides, and inverted for viewing live cells in Petri dishes. Despite its imaging advances, the basic architecture of the compound microscope has not substantially been modified in centuries.

This has now changed, with the recent release of the Revolve hybrid compound microscope, developed by Echo Laboratories (Echo), which has set a new precedent in microscope usability and design. The Revolve combines the full functionality of both upright and inverted microscopes in one instrument, and can switch between the two imaging modes relatively swiftly and easily. This gives the flexibility to view many types of samples with one microscope to a level of 300 350 nanometers resolution.

“More than 70 percent of labs end up having both inverted and upright microscopes,” said Jeff Huber, Director of Sales for Echo Laboratories. “But both uprights and inverts use similar objectives, illuminators, position systems and cameras. Why duplicate all of these expensive components? And why take up valuable lab space with two instruments? So, Echo Laboratories engineered a way to merge these two systems into one unified instrument, which is the Revolve microscope.”

Brightfield, Phase Contrast and Epifluorescence Imaging with iPad and Wireless Upload
his is a compound, infinity-path microscope, with applications for brightfield, phase contrast, and epi-fluorescence imaging. Current glass selection includes the entire line of Olympus objectives. Due to the unique nature of the upright/inverted combination, both a high-NA and long-working-distance transmitted-light condensers are available to support phase and brightfield. A high-accuracy locking mechanism is used to securely hold the condenser assembly in place, while still allowing for easy removal by a single lever.

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Since the release of the first commercial atomic force microscope (AFM) about 30 years ago, technology advances have steadily been implemented to improve their performance. Now, the most recent advance in ambient-temperature AFMs is making them more compact, portable and user-friendly, which is enabled by Negative-Stiffness vibration isolation.

The atomic force microscope (AFM) has become one of the foremost tools for imaging and measuring materials and cells on the nanoscale. Revealing sample details at the atomic level, with resolution on the order of fractions of a nanometer, the AFM is instrumental for imaging an array of applications, such as defining surface characterizations, lithography, data storage, and manipulation of atoms and nano-sized structures on a variety of surfaces.

The AFM utilizes a sharp tip (probe) with a radius of curvature on the order of a few nanometers attached to the end of a tiny cantilever used to scan across a sample surface to image its topography and material properties. When the tip is brought into proximity of a sample surface, forces between the tip and the surface lead to a deflection of the cantilever. This deflection is recorded using, typically, a laser beam that is reflected from the top surface of the cantilever to a photo-sensitive detector. The resultant change of position of the cantilever/probe/tip permits characteristics such as mechanical, electrostatic, magnetic, chemical and other forces to be precisely measured by the AFM. These characteristics are displayed in a three-dimensional surface profile of the sample (in the X, Y and Z axes), an advantage that the AFM can provide compared to other microscopy techniques.

Although AFM technology has advanced considerably, its benefits have not always been easily accessible for researchers requiring AFM adaptability, portability. Nor have AFMs been adequately accessible in nanotechnology student laboratories, because of lack of student skill in their operation, and budget limitations on the number of AFMs at their disposal.

A More Portable, More User-Friendly AFM
These inhibitions have now been mitigated by a relatively new compact, portable and user-friendly ambient-temperature AFM. Developed by NanoMagnetics Instruments, a leading manufacturer of scanning probe microscopes for low-temperature applications, the ezAFM+ atomic force microscope is a benchtop instrument designed for short learning times, quick setup, and ease of transport.

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By Jim McMahon

(Legacy Article) Professor Jian-Young Wu has been conducting research on waves of neuronal activity in the neocortex of the brain. Wu and his colleagues at the Department of Physiology and Biophysics at Georgetown University Medical Center visualize wave-like patterns in the brain cortex using optical imaging and voltage-sensitive dyea method that depends on robust vibration isolation. Their neuronal specimens are derived from slices of rat neocortex, the outer layer of a mammal's brain, which is involved in higher functions such as sensory perception and generation of motor commands and, in humans, language.

The neurons of the neocortex are arranged in vertical structures called neocortical columns that measure about 0.5 mm in diameter and 2 mm in depth. Each column typically responds to a sensory stimulus representing a certain body part, or region of sound or vision.

In the human neocortex, it is postulated that there are about a half-million of these columns, each of which contains approximately 60,000 neurons.

The neocortex can be viewed as a huge web, consisting of billions to trillions of neurons and hundred of trillions of interconnections. While individual neurons are too simple to have intelligence, the collective behavior of the billions of interneuronal interactions occurring each second can be highly intelligent.

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Negative-stiffness Minus K BM-8 vibration isolator beneath the Neubrescope.

By Jim McMahon

The latest generation of fiber optic sensing systems employed to monitor well conditions can augment operational performance in the oil & gas industry. Critical data about the downhole well environment from distributed fiber optic sensing (DFOS) systems improves engineers and scientists ability to arrive at decisions that support operational optimization. This leads to well production performance enhancement and safety at the well site, with the ultimate goal of optimizing production from oil and gas wells. There is no other current method to acquire the quality and level of detail about physical conditions in a wellbore compared to fiber optics.

Distributed acoustic sensing (DAS) is mainly used to listen to hydraulic fracturing related signals, fluid and gas flow signals, or to sense seismic source response, such as in a vertical seismic profile (VSP). DAS senses changes in small physical acoustic vibrations along a glass fiber optic strand encased in a cable to measure vibrations. There are thousands of detection points along the fiber in the subsurface fiber optic cable.

DFOS is a technology that enables continuous, real-time measurements along the entire length of a fiber optic cable at minimal spatial intervals. Unlike conventional sensor systems that rely on discrete sensors measuring at pre-determined points, distributed sensing does not rely upon manufactured, discrete sensors, but uses the optical fiber itself as both sensing device and two-way transmitter of the signal (light). Optical fiber is the sensing element. without any additional transducers in the optical path. Surface instruments called interrogator units (IU) send a series of laser light pulses into the fiber and records the return of the naturally occurring back-scattered light signal as a function of time. In doing this, the distributed sensing system measures at all points along the fiber which are at a pre-determined clock-time interval over periods of well operational time

Because fiber optic cable can be installed in harsh environments for long periods of time, the technology holds promise for environmental monitoring of sensitive geologic operations. Many geofluid systems require dynamic acoustic, temperature, strain and pressure monitoring at great pressure, depth and temperature. Sensors that employ fiber optic cables serve well for such deployments because they can withstand adverse environments. Downhole application includes oil and gas wells (hydraulic fracture completion operations, flow-back operations, long-term well monitoring, and well-integrity monitoring), geothermal wells, deep industrial waste disposal wells and other harsh environment applications.

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Press Release:
New Ultra-Thin CT-2 Low-Frequency Vibration Isolation Platform Adapts
to Space Constraints in Critical Micro- and Nano-Microscopy
(replaces the CT-1)

Full release...