Helios can be configured to probe transients
in any of the following spectral regions:
• 350-750 nm
• 450-800 nm
• 800-1600 nm
Spectral
Resolution:
Spectral resolution of the spectrometers
inside of Helios can be adjusted to customer’s
requirements.
Standard spectral resolution:
• VIS – 1.5 nm
• NIR – 3.5 nm
Time Window:
Standard - 3.3 ns
Optional - up to 8 ns
Temporal Resolution:
The instrument response function is determined
by the customer’s laser system and
has a typical FWHM of 1.4 times longer
than the laser pulse duration. The intrinsic
temporal resolution is 7 fs.
Temporal Chirp of
the Probe Pulse:
Helios employs an all-reflective supercontinuum
generation setup. This results in a very
low temporal chirp of the probe pulse
– ca. 200 fs (Value measured for
chirp optimized alignment, and is not
applicable to all probe alignment variations).
Transient Absorption
Anisotropy:
An optional extension to Helios allows
for transient absorption anisotropy measurements.
Probe Reference:
To accommodate additional experimental
requirements Helios has an option for
a second probe (reference) channel. In
this variant the probe beam is split into
two before passing through the sample.
While one leg travels through the sample,
the other is sent directly to the reference
spectrometer that monitors the fluctuations
in the probe beam intensity. The main
advantage of this technique is that it
allows the user to achieve the specified
signal-to-noise ratio with a lower number
of averaged laser pulses. This method
is primarily used for the experiments
with low repetition rate and/or easily
photodegradable samples where the number
of laser shots is strongly limited. The
advantage of the standard single probe
channel detection method remains in the
simpler optical alignment, which is especially
useful for multiuser facilities. With
the current versatility of Helios a user
can decide whether to run a single probe
channel experiment or to utilize the dual
channel detection. The switching between
the two data acquisition modes is very
quick and simple.
Data Format:
Helios produces a 3-Dimensional Wavelength-Time-Absorbance
data matrix in a form of an ASCII CSV file,
which can be easily processed with our software
or third party software.
Fiber optics coupled multichannel spectrometer
with InGaAs sensor with 3.5 nm intrinsic
resolution. Sensitivity range: 800-1600
nm. Maximum spectral acquisition rate
- 7900 spectra/s. Can be mounted away
from Helios enclosure
Laser frequency range:
10-5000 Hz (depending on the digitizer
choice).
Software:
Data acquisition:
Instrument control and data acquisition are governed by LabVIEW-based software which allows for experiment automation, such as the current optical delay step size, the averaging time for each transient spectrum, and the time window. Alternatively, the user can adjust the above parameters while the data collection process is running. Random delay line stepping is also available for the above regimes.
Data analysis:
Helios comes with a complete data acquisition
HeliosTM and data analysis Surface XplorerTM software package. Please refer to
the Surface Xplorer section for more
details.
Dimensions:
W24” x L36” x H10” (W610
x L915 x H250mm)
For more
details and pricing information please Contact
Us
I've set up a number of pump-probe
experiments including a white-light
continuum probe-based system. Based
on this, I can certainly say that
the attention to detail paid when
developing the HELIOS instrument
has paid off in terms of convenience
and reliability. Since the moment
we've had the HELIOS installed it
has become one of the most used
pieces of equipment in our labs
and has certainly rewarded the investment
we've put in.
Dr.
Joel Hales
Senior Research Scientist
Georgia Institute of Technology
This system is the most convenient
we've used for ultrafast transient
absorption detection, and achieves
excellent signal-to-noise with very
little day-to-day adjustment. The
technical and customer support have
been excellent.
Dr.
Emily Weiss
Clare Boothe Luce Assistant Professor
Department of Chemistry, Northwestern
University
We purchased a prototype of the
Helios system seven years ago, and
since then we have been using it
continuously. It is easy to align
and it provides excellent and highly
reproducible data. The software
for the acquisition of transient
absorption data is easy to use and
provides a clear picture of the
spectral evolution during the experiment.
The Surface Xplorer Pro software
provides a very good support for
the spectral and kinetic analysis
of transient absorption data.
I would highly recommend both the
instrument and the software.
Dr.
Claudio Chiorboli
Research Director
Istituto per la Sintesi Organica
e la Fotoreattività (ISOF)
CNR
Dipartimento di Chimica dell'Università
di Ferrara
Purchasing the HELIOS system
has saved us a lot of time in building
the instrument and writing the code.
We use it all the time and it is
great. The Surface Xplorer software
is very good for analyzing the data.
I would highly recommend purchasing
this instrument!
Dr.
Joy E. Haley
Air Force Research Laboratory
Wright-Patterson Air Force Base
Thank you very much for your
outstanding customer care! You guys
are awesome. And so much different
than other companies in this business.
Dr.
Astrid M. Müller
California Institute of Technology
The Helios system has become one of the most requested instruments at the CNM and is usually booked a month or two in advance.
Dr.
David Gosztola
Argonne National Laboratory
Center for Nanoscale Materials
Gone are the days when you had to
worry about spending months to set
up a transient absorption spectrophotometer
for the femtosecond laser system.
When we decided to purchase a femtosecond
laser system, we approached Ultrafast
Systems for help setting up the transient
absorption instrument. Within a week
of the arrival of the laser, the UFS
engineers came over and set up the
whole system in just one day. The
next day we could already start collecting
data. Since then it has been used
without a hitch. For any new user
it takes only few minutes to get acquainted
with the software.
The Helios spectrometer from Ultrafast
Systems is a state of the art technology
that deserves to be on the bench
top of every photochemist. The pricing
of the whole package is modest and
it is user-friendly. For us, it
was a big saving of manpower and
time. The system is well thought
out. Its simplicity, compactness
and ease of use are some of the
best features that I have ever seen
in any commercial or homebuilt system.
With Helios we are planning to
tackle many issues related to the
charge transfer processes in semiconductor
nanostructures and molecular clusters.
Prof. Prashant Kamat, The Notre Dame Radiation
Laboratory, University of Notre
Dame, IN.
I love it! This is a great product
that I definitely recommend.
Prof. Clemens Burda (on Helios), Case Western
Reserve University.
There were some software bugs,
initially, but the technical support
was more than adequate to keep these
problems from detracting from the
product.
On the scale 1-5 I would rate Helios:
• Reliability: 5
• Quality: 5
• Easy to use: 5
Prof. George N. Gibson, University of Connecticut.
The femtosecond spectrometer
system we obtained from you is terrific,
providing excellent and valuable
data for us. We appreciate that
very much. Because I have many friends
in Japan, I hope that our high evaluation
on your company help your business
in Japan.
Prof. Shunichi Fukuzumi, Department of
Material and Life Science, Osaka
University, Japan .
Both HELIOS and HALCYONE are easy to align even if you are not a big expert so you can save time to collect many data that you can analyze with the support of the very well done software Surface Xplorer Pro.
Moreover technicians are always in contact with you to solve all the problems. Thank you.
Dr. Arianna Barbafina (post doc at Chemistry Department, University of Perugia, ITALY under the supervision of Prof. Fausto Elisei)
Kevin Flavin, Katherine Lawrence, Juergen Bartelmess, Mariusz Tasior, Cristina Navio, Carla Bittencourt, Donal F. O’Shea, Dirk M. Guldi, and Silvia Giordani. “Synthesis and Characterization of Boron Azadipyrromethene Single‐Wall Carbon Nanotube Electron Donor‐Acceptor Conjugates”. Published online 10.1021/nn102831x www.acsnano.org
Joy E. Haley, Douglas M. Krein, Jennifer L. Monahan, Aaron R. Burke, Daniel G. McLean, Jonathan E. Slagle, Albert Fratini, and Thomas M. Cooper. “Photophysical Properties of a Series of Electron‐Donating and ‐Withdrawing Platinum Acetylide Two‐Photon Chromophores”J. Phys. Chem. A, Vol. 115, No. 3, 2011.
Varnavski O. Ramakrishna, G. Kim, J. Lee, D. Goodson, T. III "Critical Size for the Observation of Quantum Confinement in Optically Excited Gold Clusters," J. Amer. Chem. Soc.2010, 132, 16‐17
Flynn, D. Ramakrishna, G. Yang H.B. Northrop, B. Stang, P. Goodson, T. III "Ultrafast Optical Excitations in Supramoleculars Metallacycles with Charge Transfer Properties,"J. Amer. Chem. Soc.2010, 132, 1348‐1358
Moreno‐Oliva, M. Casado, J. Lopez Navarrete, J. Patchkovskii, S. Harpham,M. Seixas de Melo, J. Amir, E. Rozen, S. Goodson, T. III "Do [all]‐S,S ‐DioxideOligothiophenes Show Electronic and Optical Properties of Oligoenes and/or of Oligothiophenes," J. Amer. Chem. Soc.2010, 132, 6231‐6242
Ulaş Kürüm, Mustafa Yüksek, H. Gul Yaglioglu, Ayhan Elmali, Aytunç Ateş, Mevlüt Karabulut, and Gasan M. Mamedov. “The effect of Thickness and/or Doping on the Nonlinear and Saturable Absorption Behaviors in Amorphous GaSe Thin Films”. JOURNAL OF APPLIED PHYSICS 108, 063102 (2010)
Christian Reichardt and Carlos E. Crespo‐Hernandez. “Ultrafast spin crossover in 4‐thiothymidine in an ionic liquid”. Chem. Commun, 2010, 46, 5963–5965 | 5963
Fausto Puntoriero, Francesco Nastasi, Sebastiano Campagna, Thomas Bura, and Raymond Ziessel. “Vectorial Photoinduced Energy Transfer Between Boron–Dipyrromethene
(Bodipy) Chromophores Across a Fluorene Bridge”. Chem. Eur. J. 2010, 16, 8832 – 8845
R. Aaron Vogt, Miya A. Peay, Thomas G. Gray, and Carlos E. Crespo‐Hernandez. “Excited‐State Dynamics of (Organophosphine)gold(I) Pyrenyl Isomers”. J. Phys. Chem. Lett.2010, 1, 1205–1211.
Karen L. Mulfort and David M. Tiede. “Supramolecular Cobaloxime Assemblies for H2 Photocatalysis: An Initial Solution State Structure‐Function Analysis”. J. Phys. Chem. B2010, 114, 14572–14581.
Christian Reichardt and Carlos E. Crespo‐Hernandez. “Room‐Temperature Phosphorescence of the DNA Monomer Analogue 4‐Thiothymidine in Aqueous Solutions after UVA Excitation”. J. Phys. Chem. Lett. 2010, 1, 2239–2243.
Mustafa Yüksek, Ulaş Kürüm, H. Gul Yaglioglu, Ayhan Elmali, and Aytunç Ateş. “Nonlinear and Saturable Absorption Characteristics of Amorphous InSe Thin Films”. JOURNAL OF APPLIED PHYSICS 107, 033115 (2010)
Jonathan J. Burdett, Astrid M. Müller, David Gosztola, and Christopher J. Bardeen. “Excited State Dynamics in Solid and Monomeric Tetracene: The Roles of Superradiance and Exciton Fission”. THE JOURNAL OF CHEMICAL PHYSICS 133, 144506 (2010)
Eric A. McArthur, Adam J. Morris‐Cohen, Kathryn E. Knowles, and Emily A. Weiss. “Charge Carrier Resolved Relaxation of the First Excitonic State in CdSe Quantum Dots Probed with Near‐Infrared Transient Absorption Spectroscopy”. J. Phys. Chem. B, Vol. xxx, No. xx, XXXX, Revised Manuscript Received: May 5, 2010.
Wenfang Sun, Bingguang Zhang, Yunjing Li, Timothy M. Pritchett, Zhongjing Li,
and Joy E. Haley. “Broadband Nonlinear Absorbing Platinum 2,20‐Bipyridine Complex Bearing 2‐(Benzothiazol‐20‐yl)‐9,9‐diethyl‐7‐ethynylfluorene Ligands” Chem. Mater, Vol. 22, No. 23, 2010.
Uwe Hahn,Sarah Engmann, Christian Oelsner, Christian Ehli, Dirk M. Guldi,and Tomas Torres “Immobilizing Water‐Soluble Dendritic Electron Donors and Electron Acceptors Phthalocyanines and Perylenediimidessonto Single Wall Carbon Nanotubes”. J. AM. CHEM. SOC. 9 VOL. 132, NO. 18, 2010 6401.
M. T. Indelli, C. Chiorboli, F. Scandola, E. Iengo, P. Osswald, F. Würthner. “Photoinduced Processes in Self‐Assembled Porphyrin/Perylene Bisimide Metallo‐supramolecular Boxes” J. Phys. Chem., B, Condensed Matter, Materials, Surfaces, Interfaces and Biophysical, 2010, 114, 14495‐14504.
M. T. Indelli, C. Chiorboli, M. Ghirotti, M. Orlandi, F. Scandola, H. J. Kim, H‐J. Kim “Photoinduced Electron Transfer in Ruthenium(II)/Tin(IV) Multiporphyrin Arrays” J. Phys. Chem., B, Condensed Matter, Materials, Surfaces, Interfaces and Biophysical, 2010, 114, 14273‐14282.
Jiamo Guo, Hideo Ohkita, Hiroaki Benten, Shinzaburo Ito, "Near‐IR Femtosecond Transient Absorption Spectroscopy of Ultrafast Polaron and Triplet Exciton Formation in Polythiophene Films with Different Regioregularities" J. Am. Chem. Soc., 131, 16869‐16880 (2009)
N. Tuccitto, I. Delfanti, E. Anastasi, V. Torrisi, F. Scandola, C. Chiorboli, V. Stepanenko, F. Würthner, A. Licciardello. “Metal Complexes” Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys. 2009, 11, 4033‐4038.
M‐P. Santoni, E. A. Medlycott, G. S. Hanan, B. Hasenknopf, A. Proust, F. Nastasi, S. Campagna, C. Chiorboli, R. Argazzi, F. Scandola. “Photoinduced energy transfer in a rod‐like dinuclear Ru(II) complex containing bis‐pyridyl‐1,3,5‐triazine ligands”. Dalt. Trans.2009, 3964‐3970.
Daniel J. Asunskis, Igor L. Bolotin, Joy E. Haley, Augustine Urbas, and Luke Hanley. “Effects of Surface Chemistry on Nonlinear Absorption of PbS Nanocrystals”. J. Phys. Chem. C2009, 113, 19824–19829.
M. Ghirotti, C. Chiorboli, C‐C. You, F. Würthner, F. Scandola. “Photoinduced Energy and Electron Transfer Processes in Porphyrin‐Perylene Bisimide Symmetric Triads” J. Phys. Chem., A, Molecules, Spectroscopy, Kinetics, Environment & General Theory, 2008, 112, 7286‐7299
Helios owners are using the instrument in a variety of projects, some of which are listed below. More detail can be found under the Selected Publications tab on this page.
Photo-processes on single wall carbon nanotubes
Photophysical properties of two-photon chromophores
Non-linear absorbing platinum complexes
Non-radiative transitions and excited state dynamics
Blinking in silver nanodot fluorescence
Acoustic vibrations in gold nanoparticles
Material properties of metal nanoparticles
Photochemistry of cadmium selenide quantum dots
Non-linear absorption of PbS nanoparticles
Non-linear absorption and optical limiting in the near infrared
Methanofullerene cations on polymer solar cells
Supramolecular conglomerates of phthalocyanines and porphyrins
Photoprocesses in triads of fullerene and phthalocyanine
Plasmon damping in colloidal metallic nanoparticles
Surface plasmon resonance of metal nanoparticles
Infrared photon harvesting using dye clusters
Femtosecond spectrometry of lobster pigments
Geometric isomers of carotenoids
Quantum Confinement in Optically Excited Gold Clusters
Optical Excitations in Supramolecular Metallocycles
Electronic Properties of Oligoenes and Oligothiophenes
Ultrafast Polaron and Triplet Exciton Formation in Polythiophene Films
Photo-induced Electron Transfer in Ruthenium(II)/Tin(IV) Multiporphyrin Arrays
Photo-induced Processes in Metallo-supramolecular Boxes
Multilayers of Terpyridine-functionalized Perylene Bisimide Metal Complexes
Photo-induced energy transfer in a rod-like dinuclear Ru(II) complex
Photo-induced Processes in Porphyrin-Perylenebisimide Symmetric Triads
Advantages:
Easy and quick installation
Easy accommodation of harmonic generators and OPAs
User-friendly
Can be fully integrated into EOS to provide continuous temporal coverage from femtoseconds to seconds
Superb data analysis software tool
Proprietary spectrograph design for greater light sensitivity and higher signal-to-noise ratio
State-of-the-art multichannel CMOS sensors
Spectrum shaping filters
2D camera for extremely precise delay stage alignment
Top quality components:
Motion and vibration control (Newport)
Detectors (Hamamatsu, Goodrich)
Gratings (JY Horiba)
Electronics (National Instruments)
Optics and optomechanics (Newport, ThorLabs, CVI)
1-year warranty including free travel to customer’s site. Unlimited phone and on-line customer support.
CaF2 based continuum generation module. Spectral range 350-750 nm. Includes a computer controlled motorized translation stage to move the crystal in order to minimize thermally induced instabilities. The stage module controls are integrated into Helios data acquisition software.
The Surface Xplorer software makes working with 3D time-resolved data fast and efficient. It combines strong presentational features including simultaneous 3D and 2D data display with powerful data analysis capabilities such as nonlinear fitting, SVD and Global Analysis.
This device is designed for monitoring beam pointing stability and beam collimation in femtosecond spectrometry experiments where variable optical delay stage is used. Includes: camera assembly (USB 2.0) and control software.
Motorized, computer controlled 2-D sample holder. Maximum translation area – 11x11 mm2. Sample holder controls are integrated into the spectrometer software. The stage is used for solid samples to minimize photodegradation effects on a kinetic profile. Labview based software is included.
These spectrometers are designed to provide the maximum light throughput in HELIOS and EOS spectrometers. They consist of an imaging spectrograph and a high-speed multichannel detector. The spectrograph utilizes a high-efficiency, ion-etched, aberration corrected holographic grating. The highly sensitive detectors can be saturated with only 20-30% of a single femtosecond continuum pulse. Therefore their full dynamic range can be utilized with even strongly absorbing samples. The spectrometers can support multi-kHz sampling rates.
