Anasys Instruments VESTA wins prestigious R&D 100 Award

Anasys Instruments has won the prestigious R&D 100 award for its new VESTA product, a tool which revolutionizes thermal analysis with its ability to perform “point & click” micro and nano thermal analysis at the push of a button. A panel of industry experts appointed by R&D magazine announced the VESTA “…as one of the 100 most technologically significant products introduced into the marketplace over the past year.”

The VESTA is a localized thermal analysis product which enables customers to obtain phase transition temperatures with micro- and nanoscale resolution. This compares to the sample-averaged information that may be obtained using traditional bulk thermal analysis tools.

Comments from around the world reinforce the value of the VESTA system. Dr. Peter Shang is Head of Thermal Property Characterization at Eastman Chemical’s Corporate Analytical Service Laboratory. “As users of the Anasys nano-TA product, we have seen the benefits of localized thermal measurements. However, this uses an AFM platform which is not as common or as easy to use for those in the bulk thermal analysis community. The VESTA provides an easy to use platform for non-AFM users to benefit from localized thermal analysis.”

In Japan, Nissan’s Dr Jiping Ye, Head of Materials Science Characterization at their Analytical Research Center in Yokosuka, says “VESTA is the first tool to enable bulk thermal analysis users to make localized thermal property measurements with ease of use through push-button control.”

The academic community also sees advantages for VESTA. Professor Duncan Craig, Head of Pharmacy at the University of East Anglia, UK, sees it as a fundamental breakthrough. “Anasys has engineered a thermal probe-based metrology tool which uses an optical microscope platform instead of an AFM. This makes VESTA very easy to use and removes the major obstacle to the adoption of localized thermal analysis in the pharmaceutical sector.”

With applications for polymer and pharmaceutical researchers, VESTA is the only solution to provide sub-micron scale localized thermal analysis.

This is the second R&D100 award for Anasys who received one in 2007 for their breakthrough nano-TA product.