The signature inked on a forged check (or a legitimate one), can be analyzed in minutes using a mass spectrometry method called DART (direct analysis in real time). DART identified small quantities of toxins, but university researchers are also using it to non-destructively analyze ink samples. Vendor JEOL offers a DART handbook online.

Quantum computers — faster, smaller, and more powerful than today's computers — may be based on quantum dots, tiny particles that exhibit discrete energy levels due to quantum confinement effects. Researchers reported a step in the right direction, using coherent optical spectroscopy to study a strongly driven quantum dot.

How long ago did the three known domains of life — eukaryotes, bacteria, and archaea — separate? When multi-dimensional gas chromatography was applied to shale samples that were loaded with oily lipid remains of archaea from a Canadian gold mine, scientists were able to date it to at least 2.7 billion years ago.

Supercritical Fluid Chromatography (SFC) is growing in several ways. Thar Instruments bought SFC pioneer Berger from Mettler. On the popularity side, SFC, called normal phase chromatography, uses much less solvent than other chromatography methods and provides complimentary HPLC selectivity. SFC enables pharmaceutical research chemists to purify new chemical entities using carbon dioxide.

Scientists can create 3D images of living cells from multiple 2D images. X-ray-based CAT scans have done this for years, but now the radiation is visible light. The entire process took about 10 seconds and can resolve details as small as half a micrometer, allowing image details of organelles inside cells.

Instead of bringing samples into the lab, makers of microscopes, spectrometers, and chromatographs are moving the other way in increasing numbers — taking their instruments out of the lab and examining samples in situ. A Chemical & Engineering News feature discusses the challenges and benefits of creating portable field-ready instruments.

Images are usually degraded when some of the light is absorbed or scattered — but research reported in Physics World allows a laser beam to focus more tightly when passing through an opaque layer — which could be very useful for imaging through scattering materials.

Scientific Computing magazine offers its 2007 Reader's Choice Awards that include Gold Awards for favorite software from Thermo Fisher for chromatography and the chemistry readers choice that went to CambridgeSoft. Other award winners in these categories include BIO-RAD, Waters, Advanced Chemistry Development, and Dionex.

A pendulum follows the classic, deterministic laws of physics. Its period is predictable. Quantum mechanics, on the other hand, is probabilistic — and the best we can say about an electron orbiting a nucleus is that there's a better chance it's in one spot rather than another. But if you build a very tiny pendulum what happens? Watch the video.