Semrock Master Catalog 2018

BrightLine ® Fluorescence Filters
Hard-coated Durability − The No Burn-out Promise
Can be cleaned and handled, even with acetone
Impervious to humidity, insensitive to temperature
No soft coatings – no exceptions
No Burn-out, No Periodic Replacement Needed
Competitor
Premium DAPI Exciter
After < 300 hours
Degraded!
Semrock
DAPI Exciter
After 1000 hours
No Change!
Stands up to intense xenon, mercury,
metal halide, LED, and halogen light sources
No adhesives in the optical path to darken,
degrade, or autofluoresce
Made with the same refractory materials as
our high “laser damage threshold” laser optics
Extremely dense, sputtered coatings do not
absorb moisture and are insensitive to temperature
Tests were performed to illustrate the resistance to optical damage of Semrock’s hard-coated filters as compared to that of a
leading competitor’s soft-coated and absorbing glass filters. Continous irradiation from a conventional xenon arc lamp was used
for the testing.
The graph on the bottom left shows how a leading competitor’s DAPI exciter filter can become severely burned out even after
only one day of exposure to 8 W/cm² of total intensity – here the transmission has dropped by 42%. By contrast, the Semrock
DAPI exciter is unchanged. Exposure of these two filters was continued with 1 W/cm² of total intensity (closely simulating the intensity
seen by an exciter near the arc lamp source in a typical fluorescence microscope). The photographs above show that the competitor’s
DAPI exciter failed catastrophically after 300 hours – both the large crack and burn-out degradation go all the way through the filter.
The Semrock filter is again unchanged even after more than 1000 hours of exposure.
The graph at bottom right shows that a leading competitor’s soft-coated filters for visible wavelengths also show significant
degradation after optical exposure, even at the intensity levels typical of most fluorescence microscopes. The transmission of
these filters drops, and the spectra shift in wavelength. As always, the Semrock hard-coated filter shows no change.
Transmission (%)
100
Semrock
90 DAPI
Exciter
80
Before
70
After 1 day
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
320 330 340 350 360 370 380 390 400 410 420
Wavelength (nm)
Competitor
DAPI
Exciter
Transmission (%)
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
Semrock
FITC
Exciter
Competitor
GFP
Exciter
Before
After 5 days
Competitor
TexRed
Exciter
20
10
0
425 450 475 500 525 550 575 600 625
Wavelength (nm)
Transmission spectra of DAPI exciters before (blue) and after (red)
exposure to 8 W/cm 2
(over 15 mm diameter) for 1 day.
Transmission spectra of soft-coated exciters (for GFP and Texas Red)
compared to a Semrock hard-coated exciter (for FITC) before (blue)
and after (red) exposure to 1 W/cm² (over 25 mm diameter) for 5 days.
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