Leatherhead, UK – 22nd April 2021 –
Life Science Newswire –Applied
Photophysics (AP) started in Mayfair, London, in April 1971. An unusual place perhaps for a start-up
scientific instrument company, was although explained by the fact that the
origins of the company lie within the Royal
Institution (RI). The Royal Institution has been at 21 Abermarle Street,
Mayfair since 1799 and conducting scientific research since Humphrey Davy
became director in 1801. Many eminent scientists have been involved in the RI
ever since then, most famously Michael Faraday who, with Davy, gave his name to
the Davy Faraday research laboratory (DFRL) established in the building next
door (20 Abermarle street).
In 1966 George Porter (Geroge, Baron
Porter of Luddenham) moved from Sheffield University to the RI and moved his
research into early uses of lasers for laser flash photolysis analysis of fast
reactions to the DFRL. A year later he was awarded a Nobel prize in chemistry
for his work. There was a demand in the scientific community for instruments
based on Porter's research. With most of the research equipment in Porter's lab
being made in the DFRL workshops, a small cottage industry began selling this
equipment to other research labs. This became formalised into the Applied
Photophysics Limited company in 1971.
We stayed in the RI throughout the
seventies, looking at several different commercial applications of laser
spectroscopy, not just laser flash photolysis. This included some of the
earliest commercial laser Raman spectrometers. The company moved out in the 1980s
to the east end of London and then eventually to our current home in
Leatherhead, Surrey, southwest- London. Throughout our history, there has been
a common thread of fast chemical kinetics and innovative spectroscopy. In the
early 1990’s we branched out from laser flash photolysis into stopped-flow spectroscopy
establishing the line of instruments that lead to the SX20 stopped-flow system
today.
In the late 1990’s we started developing
Circular Dichroism stopped-flow instruments, with the introduction of the
Pi-Star, — a high-performance CD and fluorescence stopped-flow instrument. This
was followed by the introduction of the Chirascan line of instruments launched
in 2004; the innovative monochromator system introduced in 2004 has been the
base of the Chirascan family ever since. Building upon the innovation of the
Chirascan, further developments include: the first and still only solid-state
detector system for UV/Vis CD spectroscopy; the first automated CD instrument
many improvements to the optics and electronics that improve system stability
and performance that are now part of the current generation of Chirascan
instruments; and several extended capabilities, for instance Circular Polarized
Luminescence (CPL) system. Today, Chirascan systems are used in cutting-edge
research in both the biopharmaceutical industry and in research laboratories
across the globe.
With a heritage of being founded in the
Royal Institution by a Nobel prize winner and bringing innovative new
technologies to market throughout our history, we have a huge responsibility to
live up to that past. The only way to do
that is to keep striving for new technologies that can deliver real
breakthroughs for science in the future, indeed you could say that we have a
laser focus on developing enabling technologies. We are excited to see what the next 50 years
can bring to keep Applied Photophysics at the forefront of novel spectroscopic
applications.
About Applied Photophysics
Applied Photophysics, headquartered in
Leatherhead, Surrey, UK, is a leading provider of solutions for biophysical
characterization of biomolecules. Chirascan™ systems use the phenomenon of
circular dichroism (CD) to characterize changes in the higher order structure
of proteins. These systems are used in cutting-edge research and to support the
development of innovator drugs and biosimilars in the biopharmaceutical
industry. The Company’s SX-range of stopped-flow spectrometers is acknowledged
globally as the gold standard for kinetic studies of fast biochemical
reactions.
For more information: https://www.photophysics.com/