Industrial process control
At the core of production quality management is process control, a statistics and engineering discipline that deals with architectures, mechanisms, and algorithms for controlling the output of a specific process. Analytical information, such a elemental analysis, chemical composition, or molecular structure data, is commonly used in to provide critical data to the statistical process control (SPC) model controlling the process. X-ray analytical techniques play an important role in many process control strategies. For example, X-ray diffraction (XRD) is to determine percent crystallinity in a batch of polymer as well as providing polymorph validation in pharmaceutical production. X-ray fluorescence (XRF) is used to control many disparate production processes, from the stoichiometry of metal oxides in cement production, to critical additives in plastics and sulfur in fuels. Rigaku offers robust benchtop X-ray instruments that were specifically designed for the production environment.
Solutions
- Benchtop XRF: Primini
- Benchtop XRD: MiniFlex™
- High-performance XRD: Ultima IV
- High-power θ/θ goniometer system: TTRAX III