SEARCHCategory Archives: Eigenvector News
Year 30
Dec 27, 2023
I believe that days go slow and years go fast
And every breath’s a gift, the first one to the last – Luke Bryan, ‘Most People are Good’
Eigenvector Research starts its 30th year this January. Reflecting on that made me think of the Luke Bryan quote above. Some days have been long, for sure. For me that’s particularly true when I’m doing administrative stuff. There are also some days that go incredibly fast. When you are “in the zone” writing code to investigate a new method you get to five o’clock and wonder where the day went. But all of the years go fast. This really hits me when I think of the things I started long ago but still haven’t finished (like that journal article on Gray Classical Least Squares). And of course when you realize your children are adults with job titles like “Senior Financial Analyst” and “Orthopedic Surgical Resident” you wonder where the years went.
Every breath is a gift, especially when you are doing something you love. In the field of chemometrics (chemical data science, machine learning) there’s just no end of things to think about and explore. And of course part of the fun is working with such a great crew. Here’s our technical staff ( I guess I can still include myself in that) at Shuckers during the 17th Eigenvector University last May. We group up differently depending on the project (software, consulting, training, webinars, helpdesk, etc.) so I get to work with EVRIbody from time to time, as do we all. That really keeps it interesting, in part because we span a wide range of ages (almost 40 years) and hobbies (ski racing, rowing, trail running, biking, baseball, photography, playing the bagpipes) and other interests (cosmology, cooking, movie and music trivia, French). (Et bien sûr j’adore encore partager le bureau derriere avec ma femme Jill, la Directrice Générale!)
It piles up. When I checked this morning there have been 24,532 commits to our software version control system. Version 9.3 is the 38th release of PLS_Toolbox. We’ll have our 18th EigenU this year and our 13th Eigenvector University Europe. I lost count long ago of how many short courses we’ve done but it’s way over 200. We’ve done over 30 webinars, and have had consulting projects with 50+ companies and national laboratories. And no end in sight!
Neal and I joke that we got into this because life is too short to drink bad coffee, bad beer, do boring work or live in a crappy place. That sounds flippant but it is actually true. So a big THANKS! to all our customers who have enabled us in this software odyssey and intellectual pursuit. We have a lot planned for 2024 that we think you will find useful! We hope to continue to serve you.
A Happy and Prosperous New Year to All!
BMW
2022 Lake Chelan Valley Scholarships Announced
Aug 5, 2022
The Lake Chelan Valley Scholarship Foundation (LCVSF) will award 20 scholarships this year to college bound seniors and previous awardees. Recipients are from Chelan Valley schools including Chelan High School (CHS) and Manson High School (MHS). Two graduates from MHS class of ’22 will receive awards: Anthony Martinez and Francisco Munoz; seven members of CHS class of ’22: Charlie Bordner, Savannah Gresham, Quinn McLaren, Beau Nordby, Liam Ross, Cassandra Sanchez and Reed Stamps; and eleven renewals: Colt Corrigan, Cody Fitzpatrick, Adrian Martinez, Emma McLaren, Odaliz Ordaz, Titus Petersen, Elise Rothlisberger, Sierra Rothlisberger, Casey Simpson, Quinn Stamps and Zoee Stamps.
Each recipient will receive $2500 for a total of $50,000 in awards this year. Checks will be presented to the recipients at the flagpole at Chelan Riverwalk Park at 10 am, Saturday, August 6.
LCVSF board member Barry M. Wise noted “This year’s pool of renewals was especially strong, with almost every previous recipient qualifying. And the small number of awards given to this year’s graduates was less a reflection of their academic achievement than of their success in attracting other scholarships.”
The LCVSF was made possible by Doug and Eva Dewar, who wished that their estates be used to help the children of the Chelan Valley. LCVSF was founded in 1991, and in that year five scholarships in the amount of $1000 each were awarded. The fund has grown substantially over the years from contributions from many people, but especially significant contributions from John Gladney, Ray Bumgardner, Don & Betty Schmitten, Marion McFadden, Virginia Husted, the Dick Slaugenhaupt Memorial and Irma Keeney. Now in its 32nd year, LCVSF has awarded over $725,000 to Chelan Valley students since its inception.
LCVSF accepts applications from residents of the Chelan valley for undergraduate education. The awards are renewable for up to four years. LCVSF welcomes applications from graduating high school seniors as well as current college students and adults returning to school.
The LCVSF board includes Betsy Kronschnabel (President), Arthur Campbell, III, Linda Mayer (Secretary), Sue Clouse, Barry M. Wise, Ph.D. and John Pleyte, M.D. (Treasurer). For further information, please contact Barry Wise at bmw@eigenvector.com.
Under Same (Old) Management
Oct 21, 2021
That’s not a headline you see very often. Usually it’s “Under New Management.” But here at Eigenvector Research we’re proud of our stability. I wrote the first version of our MATLAB-based PLS_Toolbox while I was in graduate school thirty-one years ago. I still oversee its development along with our other software products.
In 1990 Partial Least Squares (PLS) regression was still fairly novel. PLS_Toolbox 1.0 included it, of course, along with a non-linear version of PLS and a number of tools for Multivariate Statistical Process Control (MSPC) including Principal Components Analysis (PCA). The goal then, as it is now, was to bring new multivariate modeling methods to users in a timely fashion and in a consistent and easy to use package.
Neal B. Gallagher joined me in 1995 to form Eigenvector Research, Inc. He has been contributing to PLS_Toolbox development for almost 27 years now, along with consulting and teaching chemometrics, (i.e. chemical data science). Our senior software developers R. Scott Koch, Bob Roginski and Donal O’Sullivan have been with us for a combined 45 years (18, 15 and 12 respectively). That continuity is one reason why our helpdesk is actually so helpful. When you contact helpdesk with a question or problem we can generally get you in touch with the staff involved in writing the original code.
To assure that continuity going forward we’ve brought some younger developers on board including Lyle Lawrence and Sean Roginski. (Lyle was still sleeping in a crib and Sean wasn’t born yet when PLS_Toolbox first came out-ha!) Both have taken deep dives into our code and have been instrumental in the recent evolution of our software. Primarily on the consulting side of EVRI, Manny Palacios brings his youthful energy and extensive experience to our clients’ data science challenges.
Over the years we have developed and refined PLS_Toolbox along with our standalone software Solo, adding many, many new routines while advancing usability. Currently we are completing the process of integrating new methods from the Python libraries scikit-learn and TensorFlow into the soon to be released PLS_Toolbox/Solo 9.0. So when we bring you new methods, like Deep Learning Artificial Neural Networks (ANNDL, shown above) or Uniform Manifold Approximation and Projection (UMAP, below) you can be sure that they are implemented, tested, supported and presented in the way that you’ve come to expect in our software. They have the same preprocessing, true cross-validation, graphical data editing, plotting features, etc. as our other methods.
Now, 25+ years in, we’re moving forward with the same vision we’ve had from the beginning: bring new modeling methods to the people that own the data in a consistent straightforward package. This same old management is working to assure that far into the future!
BMW
Lake Chelan Valley Scholarships for 2021 Announced
Aug 3, 2021
For 2021 the Lake Chelan Valley Scholarship Fund (LCVSF) will award 18 scholarships to college bound seniors and previous awardees currently attending. Recipients are from Chelan Valley schools including Chelan High School (CHS) and Manson High School (MHS). Included this year are three graduates from MHS class of ’21: Jonathan Fernandez, Cody Fitzpatrick and Zoe Thomas; seven members of CHS class of ’21: Cash Corrigan, Adrian J. Martinez, Nancy Carmona Palestino, Nancy Perez, Aden Slade, Dayana Vega-Ramirez and Ruby Wier; and eight renewals: Alvaro Arteaga, Emma McLaren, Olivia Nygreen, Sierra Rothlisberger, Casey Simpson, Joe Strecker, Addi Torgesen and Tobin Wier. Ms. Rothlisberger and Mr. Simpson are designated as the Betty Schmitten Art Scholarship recipients.
Each recipient will receive $2750 for a total of $49,500 in awards this year. Checks will be presented to the recipients at the flagpole at Chelan Riverwalk Park at 10 am, Saturday, August 7.
Board member Dr. John Pleyte reflected on this year’s recipients, “We had a very good group of applicants this year, and we were especially impressed with the renewals. It’s great to see these scholars transition successfully from high school to college, and also from community college to four year schools.”
The LCVSF was made possible by Doug and Eva Dewar, who wished that their estates be used to help the children of the Chelan Valley. LCVSF was founded in 1991, and in that year five scholarships in the amount of $1000 each were awarded. The fund has grown substantially over the years from contributions from many people, but especially significant contributions from John Gladney, Ray Bumgardner, Don & Betty Schmitten, Marion McFadden, Virginia Husted, the Dick Slaugenhaupt Memorial and Irma Keeney. Now in its 31th year, LCVSF has awarded over $675,000 to Chelan Valley students since its inception.
LCVSF accepts applications from residents of the Chelan valley for undergraduate education. The awards are renewable for up to four years. LCVSF welcomes applications from graduating high school seniors as well as current college students and adults returning to school.
The LCVSF board includes Betsy Kronschnabel (President), Arthur Campbell, III, Linda Mayer (Secretary), Sue Clouse, Barry M. Wise, Ph.D. and John Pleyte, M.D. (Treasurer). For further information, please contact Barry Wise at bmw@eigenvector.com.
COVID-19 Upate: Still Here to Help You
Mar 18, 2020
As with most of you, we here at Eigenvector are very concerned about the COVID-19 outbreak and its impact on our families, friends, customers and communities. We continue to monitor its evolution closely, especially in regard to our employees and their families. The direct effect of COVID-19 on the daily business of Eigenvector, however, is modest. For over 25 years now everybody, or as we say, EVRIbody in our organization has worked from home. We’re all set up to work remotely as that is how we’ve always done it. We expect to be working our usual hours for the foreseeable future with perhaps a few exceptions to work with and around spouses, children and parents now occupying our homes or needing our assistance.
We recognize that many of our colleagues are experiencing work disruptions and many are now working from home. As experienced home workers we offer here a few tips for making your home office productive and keeping your work/life balance intact.
- Start early and try to work regular hours.
- Shower, shave and dress as if you were going to the office. (The EigenGuys aren’t very good at this, especially the shaving part.)
- If you have a monitor get the level correct and set your keyboard up in a way that supports your wrists.
- Get a good chair and resist the urge to work in places that don’t promote good posture.
- A headset with noise cancellation and a good microphone is useful for Webex meetings, conference calls, regular phone calls and simply screening out distractions.
- Check in with co-workers frequently.
- Plan some time for exercise even if it’s just a walk around the block or some stretching and sets of sit-ups and push-ups. I like mid-morning for this.
- Try to stay out of the kitchen (this is tough) unless you’re using your break time to start long prep time meals (crock-pot, pizza dough, etc.).
- Set a “closing time” and try to stick to it. Spouses/partners can enforce this by setting a beer on the homeworker’s desk at the appointed time. (This always works on me!)
Many of our software users are among these new homeworkers and we are working to accommodate them. In particular, users that work with our floating license versions of PLS_Toolbox or Solo may have trouble reaching EVRI’s Floating License Server when working from home. We have just posted a video addressing this issue: Using Floating License Software Remotely. As always, if you have any questions regarding our software or online courses please contact our helpdesk and we will respond promptly. And to our consulting clients: we are available as always.
Our 15th Annual Eigenvector University, originally scheduled for April 26-May 1, has been postponed until August 16-21. We will of course continue to monitor the situation to determine if additional delays are warranted.
Finally, we also have plans to offer additional resources online. We will step up the frequency of our “EVRI-thing You Need to Know About..” webinar series to twice per month. The next one, “EVRI-thing You Need to Know About Performing PLS-DA” is Wednesday, March 25 at 8:00 am PDT, (16:00 CET). We also plan to offer a couple of our short courses via webinar in the coming months. We will let you know when plans are finalized.
Above all, stay healthy!
BMW
Chimiométrie 2020: Models, Models Everywhere!
Feb 4, 2020
I’ve just returned from Conference Chimiométrie 2020, the annual French language chemometrics conference, now in its 21st edition. The conference was held in Liège and unfortunately there wasn’t much time to explore the city. I can tell you they have a magnificent train station, Gare de Liège is pictured at right.
The vibrant French chemometrics community always produces a great conference with good attendance, well over 120 at this event, and food and other aspects were as enjoyable as ever thanks to the local organizing committee and conference chair Professor Eric Ziemons.
Age Smilde got the conference off to a good start with “Common and Distinct Components in Data Fusion.” In it he described a number of different model forms, all related to ANOVA Simultaneous Components Analysis (ASCA), for determining if the components in different blocks of data are unique or shared. What struck me most about this talk and many of the ones that followed is that there are a lot of different models out there. As Age says, “Think about the structure of your data!” The choice of model structure is critical to answering the questions posed to the data. And it is only with solid domain knowledge that appropriate modeling choices are made.
In addition to a significant number of papers on multi-block methods, Chimiométrie included quite a few papers in the domain of metabolomics, machine learning, Bayesian methods, and a large number of papers on hyper spectral image analysis (see the Programme du Congrès). All in all, a very well rounded affair!
I was pleased to see a good number of posters that utilized our PLS_Toolbox and in some instances MIA_Toolbox software very well! The titles are given below with links to the posters. We’re always happy to help researchers achieve an end result or provide a benchmark towards the development of new methods!
Identification of falsified antimalarial drugs using an innovative low cost portable near infrared spectrophotometer by Moussa Yabré et. al.
Development of plant phenotyping tools for potato resistance against Phytophthora infestans by François Stevens et. al.
Metabolomic fingerprinting of Moroccan Argan kernels using two platform techniques UPLC-TOF/MS and UPLC-DAD: A geographic classification by Mourad Kharbach et. al.
Quantitative resolution of emulsifiers in an agrochemical formulation by S. Mukherjee et. al.
Assay of Ibuprofen Tablets at High Speed with Spatially Resolved Near Infrared Spectroscopy by Philipe Hubert
Discrimination of Diesel Fuels Marketed in Morocco Using FTIR, GC-MS Analysis and Chemometric Methods by Issam Barra et. al.
Application of vibrational spectroscopy and chemometrics to assess the quality of locally produced antimalarial medicines in the Democratic Republic of Congo by P.H. Ciza et. al.
Thanks again to the conference organizers. À l’année prochaine!
BMW
Eigenvector Turns 25
Jan 1, 2020
Eigenvector Research, Inc. was founded on January 1, 1995 by myself and Neal B. Gallagher, so we’re now 25 years old. On this occasion I feel that I should write something though I’m at a bit of loss with regards to coming up with a significantly profound message. In the paragraphs below I’ve written a bit of history (likely overly long).
We started Eigenvector with each of us buying a Power Mac 8100 with keyboard, mouse and monitor. These were about $4k, plus another $1700 to upgrade the 8Mb RAM it came with to 32Mb. Liz Callanan at The MathWorks gave us our first MATLAB licenses-thanks! PLS_Toolbox was in version 1.4 and still being marketed under Eigenvector Technologies. Our founding principle was and still is:
Life is too short to drink bad beer, do boring work or live in a crappy place.
That’s a bit tongue-in-cheek but it’s basically true. We certainly started Eigenvector to keep ourselves in interesting work. For me that meant continuing with chemometrics, data analysis in chemistry. New data sets are like Christmas presents, you never know what you’ll find inside. For Neal I think it meant anything you could do that let you use math on a daily basis. Having both grown up in rural environments and being outdoor enthusiasts location was important. And the bit about beer is just, well, duh!
As software developers we found it both interesting and challenging to make tools that allowed users (and ourselves!) to build successful models for calibration, classification, MSPC etc. As consultants we found a steady stream of projects which required both use of existing chemometric methods and adaptation of new ones. As we became more experienced we learned a great deal about what can make models go bad: instrument drift, differences between instruments, variable and unforeseen background interferents, etc. and often found ourselves as the sanity check to overly optimistic instrument and method developers. Determining what conclusions are supportable given the available data remains an important function for us.
Our original plan included only software and consulting projects but we soon found out that there was a market for training. (This seems obvious in retrospect.) We started teaching in-house courses when Pat Wiegand asked us to do one at Union Carbide in 1996. A string of those followed and soon we were doing workshops at conferences. And then another of our principles kicked in:
Let’s do something, even if it’s wrong.
Entrepreneurs know this one well. You can never be sure that any investment you make in time or dollars is actually going to work. You just have to try it and see. So we branched out into doing courses at open sites with the first at Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) in 1998, thanks for the help Ali Çinar! Open courses at other sites followed. Eigenvector University debuted at the Washington Athletic Club in Seattle in 2006. We’re planning the 15th Annual EigenU for this spring. The 10th Annual EigenU Europe will be in France in October and our third Basic Chemometrics PLUS in Tokyo in February. I’ve long ago lost count of the number of courses we’ve presented but it has to be well north of 200.
Our first technical staff member, Jeremy M. Shaver, joined us in 2001 and guided our software development for over 14 years. Our collaborations with Rasmus Bro started the next year in 2002 and continue today. Initially focused on multi-way methods, Rasmus has had a major impact on our software from numerical underpinnings to usability. Our Chemometrics without Equations collaboration with Donald Dahlberg started in 2002 and has been taught at EAS for 18 consecutive years now.
We’ve had tremendously good fortune to work with talented and dedicated scientists and engineers. This includes our current technical staff (in order of seniority) R. Scott Koch, Robert T. “Bob” Roginski, Donal O’Sullivan, Manny Palacios and Lyle Lawrence. We wouldn’t trade you EigenGuys for anybody! Also past staff members of note including Charles E. “Chuck” Miller, Randy Bishop and Willem Windig.
So what’s next? The short answer: more of the same! It’s both a blessing and a curse that the list of additions and improvements that we’d like to make to our software is never ending. We’ll work on that while we continue to provide the outstanding level of support our users have come to expect. Our training efforts will continue with our live courses but we also plan more training via webinar and in other venues. And of course we’re still doing consulting work and look forward to new and interesting projects in 2020.
In closing, we’d like to thank all the great people that we’ve worked with these 25 years. This includes our staff members past and present, our consulting clients, academic colleagues, technology partners, short course students and especially the many thousands of users of our PLS_Toolbox software, its Solo derivatives and add-ons. We’ve had a blast and we look forward to continuing to serve our clients in the new decade!
Happy New Year!
BMW
PLS_Toolbox at 20th Chimiométrie
Feb 16, 2019
Chimiométrie 2019 was held in Montpellier, January 30 to February 1. Now in its 20th year the conference attracted over 150 participants. The conference is mostly in French, (which I have been trying to learn for many years now), but also with talks in English. The Scientific and Organizing Committee Presidents were Ludovic Duponchel and J.M. Roger, respectively.
Eigenvector was proud to sponsor this event, and it was fun to have a display table and a chance to talk with some of our software users in France. As usual, I was on the lookout for talks and posters using PLS_Toolbox. I especially enjoyed the talk presented by Alice Croguennoc, Some aspects of SVM Regression: an example for spectroscopic quantitative predictions. The talk provided a nice intro to Support Vectors and good examples of what the various parameters in the method do. Alice used our implementation of SVMs, which adds our preprocessing, cross-validation and point-and-click graphics to the publicly available LIBSVM package. Ms. Croguennoc demonstrated some very nice calibrations on a non-linear spectroscopic problem.
I also found three very nice posters which utilized PLS_Toolbox:
Chemometric methods applied to FT-ICR/MS data: comprehensive study of aromatic sulfur compounds in gas oils by J. Guillemant, M. Lacoue-Nègre, F. Albrieux, L. Duponchel, L.P de Oliveira and J.F Joly.
Chemometric tools associated to FTIR and GC-MS for the discrimination and the classification of diesel fuels by suppliers by I. Barra, M. Kharbach, Y. Cherrah and A. Bouklouze.
Preliminary appreciation biodegradation of formate and fluorinated ethers by means of Raman spectroscopy coupled with chemometrics by M. Marchetti, M. Offroy, P. Bourson, C. Jobard, P. Branchu, J.F. Durmont, G. Casteran and B. Saintot.
By all accounts the conference was a great success, with many good talks and posters covering a wide range of chemometric topics, a great history of the field by Professor Steven D. Brown, and a delicious and fun Gala dinner at the fabulous Chez Parguel, shown at left. The evening included dancing, and also a song, La Place De la Conférence Chimiométrie, (sung to the tune of Patrick Bruel’s Place des Grands Hommes), written by Sylvie Roussel in celebration of the conference’s 20th year and sung with great gusto by the conferees. Also, the lecture hall on the SupAgro campus was very comfortable!
Congratulations to the conference committees for a great edition of this French tradition, with special thanks to Cécile Fontange and Sylvie Roussel of Ondalys for their organizational efforts. À l’année prochaine!
BMW
Lake Chelan Valley Scholarships for 2018 Announced
Jul 31, 2018
The Lake Chelan Valley Scholarship Foundation (LCVSF) will award 18 scholarships in the amount of $2500 each. The recipients include three members of Chelan’s Class of 2018: Ahimelec Diaz, Gage Martin and Madeline Peebles; six members of Manson’s Class of 2018: Alyssa La Mar, Veronica Lulo, Jessica Medina, Joe Strecker, Adeleine Torgesen and Magali Vargas; and nine renewals by previous recipients: Neil Carleton, Henry Elsner, Melena Evig, Delacy Machus, Anabeth Morales, Jessica Oules, Abbigail Phelps, Zachary Phelps and Bethany Trusel.
“The nine successful renewals show that most of our previous recipients are doing well in college, and we’re certainly glad to see that” noted LCVSF board member Barry Wise. “This year’s batch of new awards included several students with quite compelling stories of overcoming hardships to get through high school and successfully apply for college. It is always humbling to read these. We’re happy to help make it just a bit easier for these kids to continue in school.”
The awards will be presented at Riverwalk Park on Saturday, August 11 at 10am. Please join us to celebrate the achievements of these young scholars.
The LCVSF was made possible by Doug and Eva Dewar, who wished that their estates be used to help the children of the Chelan Valley. LCVSF was founded in 1991, and in that year five scholarships in the amount of $1000 each were awarded. The fund has grown substantially over the years from contributions from many people, but especially significant contributions from John Gladney, Ray Bumgardner, Don & Betty Schmitten, Marian McFadden, Virginia Husted, the Dick Slaugenhaupt Memorial and Irma Keeney. This year’s scholarships total $45,000.
LCVSF accepts applications from residents of the Chelan valley for undergraduate education. The awards are renewable for up to four years. LCVSF welcomes applications from graduating high school seniors as well as current college students and adults returning to school.
The LCVSF board includes Betsy Kronschnabel (President), Arthur Campbell, III, Linda Mayer (Secretary), Sue Clouse, Barry M. Wise, Ph.D. and John Pleyte, M.D. (Treasurer). For further information, please contact Barry Wise at bmw@eigenvector.com.
EigenU 2018 Poster Winners
May 29, 2018
The 13th Annual Eigenvector University was held April 29-May 4 in Seattle. It was a busy, vibrant week with 40 students with a wide variety of backgrounds attending along with 10 instructors. Users of our PLS_Toolbox and Solo chemometrics packages showed some of their recent results at the Wednesday evening poster session, which has become an EigenU tradition. Now combined with our PowerUser Tips & Tricks session, it makes for a full evening of scientific and technical exchange fueled by hors d’oeuvres and adult beverages.
This year’s best poster, (as judged by the EVRI staff), was “Nondestructive Analysis of Historic Photographs” by Arthur McClelland, Elena Bulat, Melissa Banta, Erin Murphy, and Brenda Bernier. The poster described how Specular Reflection FTIR was used with Principal Components Analysis (PCA) to discriminate between coatings applied to prints in the Harvard class albums from 1853-1864.
For his efforts Arthur took home a pair of Bose Soundsport Wireless Headphones. Arthur is shown above accepting his prize from Eigenvector President Barry M. Wise and Vice-president Neal B. Gallagher. Congratulations Arthur!
The runner up poster was “Analytical Approach to Investigate Salt Disproportionation in Tablet Matrices by Stimulated Raman Scattering Microscopy” by Benjamin Figueroa, Tai Nguyen, Yongchao Su, Wei Xu, Tim Rhodes, Matt Lamm, and Dan Fu. The poster demonstrates how the the conversion of Active Pharmaceutical Ingredient (API) from its active salt form to its inactive free base form can be quantified in Raman images of tablets. Benjamin received a Bose Soundlink Bluetooth Speaker for his contribution. Kudos Benjamin!
We were also pleased to have several other very interesting poster submissions, as shown below:
Candace D. Harris, Xianglei Mao, Jiaojin Song, Jonathan Woodward, Lewis Johnson, and Ashley C. Stowe, “Multivariate Limit of Detection Interval for PLS Calibration Models via Laser Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy on U-235 and U-238 Enriched Glasses.”
Po Ki Tse, Amanda Lines, Sam Bryan, and Jenifer Shafer, “Chemometric Analysis to Predict the Formation of Interfacial Solids.”
Yulan Hernandez, Lesly Lagos and Betty C. Galarreta, “Selective and Efficient Mycotoxin Detection with Nanoaptasensors using SERS and Multivariate Analysis.”
Devanand Luthria and James Harnly, “Applications of Spectral Fingerprinting and Multivariate Analysis in Agricultural Sciences.”
Thanks to all EigenU 2018 poster presenters for a fun and informative evening!
BMW
Eigenvector Research, Inc. and Metrohm Announce Global Partnership
Nov 22, 2017
Integration of Eigenvector’s multivariate analysis software with Metrohm’s Vis-NIR analyzers will give users access to advanced calibration and classification methods.
Metrohm’s spectroscopy software Vision Air 2.0 supports prediction models created in EVRI’s PLS_Toolbox and Solo software and offers convenient export and import functionality to enable measurement execution and sample analysis in Metrohm’s Vision Air software. Customers will benefit from data transfer between PLS_Toolbox/Solo and Vision Air and will enjoy a seamless experience when managing models and using Metrohm’s NIR laboratory instruments. Metrohm has integrated Eigenvector’s prediction engine, Solo_Predictor, so that users can apply any model created in PLS_Toolbox/Solo.
Data scientists, researchers and process engineers in a wide variety of industries that already use or would like to use Eigenvector software will find this solution appealing. PLS_Toolbox and Solo’s intuitive interface and advanced visualization tools make calibration, classification and validation model building a straightforward process. A wide array of model types, preprocessing methods and the ability to create more complex model forms, such as hierarchical models with conditional branches, make Eigenvector software the preferred solution for many.
“This a win-win for users of Metrohm NIR instruments and users of Eigenvector chemometrics software” says Eigenvector President Dr. Barry M. Wise. “Thousands of users of EVRI software will be able to make models for use on Metrohm NIR instruments in their preferred environment. And users of Metrohm NIR instruments will have access to more advanced data modeling techniques.”
Researchers benefit from Metrohm’s Vis-NIR Instrument and Vision Air software through instruments covering the visible and NIR wavelength range, intuitive operation, state-of-the art user management with strict SOPs and global networking capabilities. Combining the solutions will create an integrated experience that will save time, improve product development process and provide better control of product quality.
Key Advantages PLS_Toolbox/Solo:
- Integration of Solo_Predictor allows users to run any model developed in PLS_Toolbox/Solo
- Allows users to make calibration and classification models in PLS_Toolbox and Solo’s user-friendly modeling environment
- Supports standard model types (PCA, PLS, PLS-DA, etc.) with wide array of data preprocessing methods
- Advanced models (SVMs, ANNs, etc.) and hierarchical models also supported
Key Advantages Vision Air:
- Intuitive workflow due to appealing and smart software concept with specific working interfaces for routine users, and lab managers
- Database approach for secure data handling and easy data management
- Powerful network option with global networking possibility and one-click instruments maintenance
- Full CFR Part 11 compliance
EVRI Users Shine in Poster Session at ICNIRS Conference
Aug 3, 2017
Hello EigenFriends and EigenFans,
The ICNIRS conference was held June 11-15 in Copenhagen, Denmark, where close to 500 colleagues gathered for the largest forum on Near-Infared Spectroscopy in the world. The conference featured several keynote lectures, classes taught by EVRI associate Professor Rasmus Bro, and also held several poster sessions where over 20 conference attendees displayed their research using EVRI software! We’d like to feature some of the posters and authors below: thanks for using our software, everyone!
- Y. Allouche, J.A. Fernandez Perna, V. Baeten, & A. Jimenez. “On-line Near Infrared Spectroscopy and Chemometrics for Characterization of Olive Oils at the Exit of a Decanter Centrifuge”
- C. Y. Bastidas, C. von Plessing, J. Troncoso, & R. del Pilar Castillo. “Quantification of an Antibiotic in Salmon Feed Pellets with NIR Spectroscopy and Multivariate Calibration”
- B. Carrasco, D. Vincke, V. Baeten, & J.A. Fernandez Perna. “Application of Near Infrared Spectroscopy and Chemometrics for the Characterization of Complex Mixtures of Food Additives”
- M. Chaudhry, G. Colelli, & M. Amodio.“Potential of Hyperspectral Imaging to Predict Quality and Shelf-Life of Fresh Rocket Leaves to be Used for Fresh-Cut Processing”
- S.Duthen, D. Kleiber, J. Dayde, C. Raynaud, & C. Levasseur-Garcia. “Determination of the Moisture Content of Gelatin Sample”
- D. Eylenbosch, J. A. Fernandez Pierna, V. Baeten, & B. Bodson. “Comparison of PLS and SVM Discriminant Analysis for NIR Hyperspectral Data of Wheat Roots in Soil”
- L. Franca, S. Grassi, M. F. Pimentel, & J. M. Amigo. “Handcraft Beer Monitoring Using NIR Handheld Equipment”
- R. Gasbarrone, S. Serranti & G. Bonifazi. “An Investigation on Non-ferrous Metals Particles Separability from Electronic Scraps using Hyperspectral Imaging and Micro-XRF Analysis”
- S. Montagneir, J. Lallemand, P. Herbert, J. Guilment, & S. Roussel. “Discriminant Strategies for Polymer Identification during Continuous On-line Processes by Near Infrared Spectroscopy”
- R. Palmieri, S. Serranti, G. Bonifazi, & F. Maffei. “Monitoring of Microplastics from Marine Environment Adopting HyperSpectral Imaging”
- J. F. Q. Pereira, C. S. Silva, M. J. Vieira, M. F. Pimentel, A. Braz, & R. S. Honorato. “Evaluation and Identification of Blood Stains in Crime Scenes with Ultra-portable NIR Spectrometer”
- Y. Pu, D. Sun, C. Riccioli, M. Buccheri, M. Grassi, T. M. P. Cattaneo, & A. Gowen. “Calibration Transfer from MicroNIR Spectrometer to Hyperspectral Imaging: A Case Study on Predicting Soluble Solids Content of Bananito Fruit (Musa acuminata)”
- M. M. Reis, I. Kaur, G. Weralupitiya, C. Wang, & M. G. Reis. “Near InfraRed Spectroscopy Applied to Non-invasive Assessment of Physical-chemical Attributes of Dairy Powders”
- R. Rios-Reina, D. L. Garcia-Gonzalez, R. M. Collejon, & J. M. Amigo. “Application of Near-Infrared (NIR) Spectroscopy and Chemometrics to Classify and Authentify Wine Vinegars from Different Protected Designation of Origin”
- J. Sun, A. McGlone, R. Kunnememeyer, N. Tomer, & M. Punter. “Which Optical Geometry is Best to Detect Vascular Browning in Apples?”
Lake Chelan Valley Scholarships Announced
Jul 31, 2017
One of my more satisfying off-work activities has been my involvement with the Lake Chelan Valley Scholarship Foundation. LCVSF gives awards for undergraduate education to residents of the Chelan Valley, including Manson, Chelan, Stehekin and Holden. Below you’ll find a note on this summer’s awards.
We are pleased to announce the Lake Chelan Valley Scholarship Foundation (LCVSF) will award 16 scholarships this Saturday in the amount of $3000 each. The recipients include six members of Chelan’s Class of 2017: Sierra Burkhard, Henry Elsner, Addie Ivory, Anabeth Morales, Jessica Oules, and Celeste Verduzco; two members of Manson’s Class of 2017: Bowen Charlton and Aurelio Gutierrez; and 8 renewals by previous recipients: Drew Carleton, Neil Carleton, Ivan DeJesus-Ramierrez, Melena Evig, Kristen Gibson, Abbigail Phelps, Megan Robinson and Tess Young.
“We had some great applications this year and we’re especially pleased that so many of our previous recipients are doing so well in school” noted LCVSF board member Barry Wise. “A slightly smaller pool of applicants plus continued growth of our fund allowed us to give both the largest awards, $3K each, and the highest total amount, $48K, ever.”
The awards will be presented at Riverwalk Park on Saturday, August 5 at 10am. Please join us to celebrate the achievements of these young scholars.
The LCVSF was made possible by Doug and Eva Dewar, who wished that their estates be used to help the children of the Chelan Valley. LCVSF was founded in 1991, and in that year five scholarships in the amount of $1000 each were awarded. The fund has grown substantially over the years from contributions from many people, but especially significant contributions from John Gladney, Ray Bumgardner, Don & Betty Schmitten, Marian McFadden, Virginia Husted, the Dick Slaugenhaupt Memorial, and Irma Keeney.
LCVSF accepts applications from residents of the Chelan valley for undergraduate education. The awards are renewable for up to four years. LCVSF welcomes applications from graduating high school seniors as well as current college students and adults returning to school.
The LCVSF board includes Betsy Kronschnabel (President), Arthur Campbell, III, Linda Mayer (Secretary), Sue Clouse, Barry M. Wise, Ph.D. and John Pleyte, M.D. (Treasurer). For further information, please contact Barry Wise at bmw@eigenvector.com.
Staff Update: Three Newcomers and a Veteran
Nov 28, 2016
This past year has brought several additions to our team and we’d like to take some time to introduce them to our community. This spring Eigenvector welcomed two new members, Dr. Benjamin Kehimkar and Mathias Darr. Benjamin completed his PhD at the University of Washington in Analytical Chemistry, and specializes in chromatography and mass spectrometry. Before joining EVRI, he was a video game developer and is the creator of two Unity3D-based games. He also enjoys cycling, cooking, and chemistry.
Mathias hails from Western Washington University, where he graduated with a degree in Applied Mathematics in 2014. Here at EVRI his focus is on signal processing and numerical methods. Mathias plays the guitar and piano, and also enjoys backpacking and hiking in the nearby Cascade mountains.
We’re really excited to have both Benjamin and Mathias on the team. Says Barry M. Wise, President of EVRI: “Benjamin and Mathias weren’t afraid to dive right into our software support and development efforts. They got up to speed quickly and have been helping customers and working on new methods for our spring 2017 releases. With them on board we can continue to accelerate our development while maintaining our high level of user support.”
Clare Wise also joins the team as a marketing and engineering intern. Clare attended University of Colorado and just graduated with a degree in Chemical and Biological Engineering. She also skied for CU’s NCAA National Champion ski team. Ms. Wise hopes to start medical school in Fall 2017, but in the meantime she’ll be updating the website as well as taking on many of the communications from EVRI (like this one!).
In addition, Eigenvectorian Dr. Robert T. “Bob” Roginski celebrated his 10th anniversary with EVRI this summer. Says Barry, “Bob is equally at home on consulting projects in pharma, medical devices and petrochemical as he is with software development. He leads our on-line applications team where all these technical areas come together. Bob’s in-depth knowledge and thoroughness assure that our customers’ models will run seamlessly and produce the expected results. We congratulate Dr. Roginski on his first 10 years at EVRI and look forward to the next 10!”
We’re very excited to have newcomers Mathias, Benjamin, and Clare on the team along with veteran Bob. They’ll all be at Eigenvector University in spring 2017, so be sure to sign up before space runs out!
CEW
EigenU Europe Recap
Nov 7, 2016
Another successful EigenU Europe is in the books with the conclusion of classes October 27 in Montpellier, France! We had a great group of students who participated in this four-day course series. Instructors included myself and Prof. Rasmus Bro, plus our special guest Dr. Sébastian Preys of Ondalys.
After a rainy start to the week, the sun finally came out on Thursday and provided an opportunity for an outdoor class photo (top). You can tell that we’re all having trouble looking towards the tremendously bright, southern France sun. The weather made for a great travel day to end the class on.
Rasmus Bro is shown introducing Parallel Factor Analysis (PARAFAC) to the class (bottom) in the Intro to Multi-way Analysis course module. Rasmus also did a module on Variable Selection, while Sébastian Preys covered Multi-block Models for Data Fusion. We also covered Clustering and Classification in addition to our introductory block of basic classes.
Many thanks to Sylvie Roussel, President of Ondalys, Cécile Fontange and Sandra Aubert for help with the local arrangements: you really made things easy for us! We really enjoyed the Marriott Courtyard, which provided a convenient location, modern conference and sleeping rooms, and delicious group lunches (I especially enjoyed the foie gras and lamb shank). We’re seriously considering return to Montpellier again next year–details to come!
Thanks to all our participants, many of whom travelled great distances to join us. This included students from across Europe and also from the United States and Australia. We trust your new chemometric skills will serve you well!
BMW
Eigenvectorian Scott Koch celebrates 10+ years with EVRI
Oct 20, 2016
Scott Koch joined Eigenvector in January, 2004, and quickly made himself indispensable. Although his title is Senior Software Engineer, Scott commented the other day, “we wear so many hats in a small company that I don’t know if a title is really useful.” He tackles a variety of jobs at EVRI including interface and database design, software version control and general troubleshooting. Scott is fluent in MATLAB, SQL, Java, Subversion and Python and contributes to our products, e.g. PLS_Toolbox and Solo, as well as working with our clients on custom applications. You can also catch him as a guest blogger for Undocumented Matlab, where he discusses his work involving Matlab-Java programming.
In addition to working at Eigenvector, Scott is also an outdoor enthusiast and distance runner, and can often be seen flying through the trails of the west coast. Here he is running the Broken Arrow Trial near Sedona, AZ. He’s also an avid backcountry skier and rally car driver.
Says Barry, President of EVRI: “When we hired Scott there was one thing on his resume that really caught my eye: ‘PSIA level II Ski Instructor: Possess an uncanny ability to coax terrified beginners down steep slopes and back onto the chair lift.’ Scott has been all that and more with regard to helping users with our software, and he’s filled a lot of gaps in our development process I didn’t even realize we had. We’re so glad Scott is part of our team!”
Thanks Scott for all your hard work! We have a lot of fun hanging out with you, and you inspire us with your athletic passions and drive to make this company better.
BMW
Eigenvector at Chimiométrie XVII in Namur
Feb 4, 2016
Last month I had the pleasure of attending Chimiométrie XVII. This installment ran from January 17-20 in the beautiful city of Namur, BELGIUM. The conference was largely in French but with many talks and posters in English. (My French is just good enough that I can get the gist of most of the French talks if the speakers put enough text on their slides!) There were many good talks and posters demonstrating a lot of chemometric activity in the French speaking world.
I was pleased to see evidence of EVRI software in many presentations and posters. I particularly enjoyed “An NIRS Prediction Engine for Discrimination of Animal Feed Ingredients” by Aitziber Miguel Oyarbide working with the folks at AUNIR. This presentation was done with Prezi which I find quite refreshing. I also enjoyed posters about standardization in milk analysis, determination of post mortem interval, evaluation of pesticide coating on cereal seeds, and sorting of archeological material. All of these researchers used PLS_Toolbox, MIA_Toolbox or Solo to good effect.
EVRI was also proud to sponsor the poster contest which was won by Juan Antonio Fernández Pierna et al. with “Chemometrics and Vibrational Spectroscopy for the Detection of Melamine Levels in Milk.” For his efforts Juan received licenses for PLS_Toolbox and MIA_Toolbox. Congratulations! We wish him continued success in his chemometric endeavors!
Finally I’d like to thank the organizing committee, headed by Pierre Dardenne of Le Centre wallon de Recherches agronomiques. The scientific content was excellent and, oh my, the food was fantastic! I’m already looking forward to the next one!
BMW
Another EigenU Europe Complete
Oct 9, 2015
The Fifth Eigenvector University Europe ran October 5-8 at the FOSS Innovation Centre in Hillerød, Denmark. Rasmus Bro and I really enjoyed the group. Everybody came well prepared (MATLAB and PLS_Toolbox installed and tested!) and loaded with questions. We covered basic chemometrics then moved on to more advanced topics.
Many thanks to the kind folks at FOSS, especially Lars Nørgaard, for use of the venue. The Innovation Centre is a beautiful facility. The coffee and snack service is great and I love lunches in the cafeteria!
Chemometrics, of course, is critical to FOSS’ success. At the heart of many of FOSS’ user-friendly application specific analyzers lies a very sophisticated calibration model. Lars leads what is possibly the largest chemometrics group in the world with a staff of about 30. We appreciate their support of the field!
We’re already starting to think about EigenU Europe for fall of 2016. We’d like to move south next year and are considering Italy, Spain or southern France. If you’ve got an idea for a venue write to me with details.
Good job class, and thanks for coming!
BMW
30 Years of Chemometrics
Sep 30, 2015
On October 1, 1985 I walked into Bruce Kowalski’s chemometrics class and my world changed forever. It was my first day of chemical engineering graduate school at the University of Washington. My M.S. thesis advisor, Prof. Harold Hager, told me that I’d probably find the methods in Bruce’s class useful in treating the data I was to collect. He was right, but more than that, it wasn’t long before I knew that I’d found something I wanted to do for a living.
A big part of the class was a project, due at the end of the semester in early December. I spent my Thanksgiving vacation working with Infometrix’s Ein*Sight software doing PCA on data from a Liquid-Fed Ceramic Melter I’d worked on at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. Ein*Sight had a limit of 100 samples and 10 variables but it ran on an IBM AT. I spent a lot of time swapping interesting samples in and out of the analysis and trying to interpret the results. I got an A on the project (Bruce gave lots of A’s!) and my study became a piece of Infometrix sales literature (left). From there I started working with Prof. Larry Ricker on my ChemE Ph.D. with Bruce on my committee. The rest, as they say, is history.
I always liked data analysis. As an undergrad in ChemE my lab partners referred to me as the “Data Magician.” I just liked massaging the numbers to see what I could tease out. Chemometrics gave me a whole new set of tools and opened my world up to high dimension data.
Chemometrics has taken me lots of interesting places over the last 30 years, and I mean that both with regards to the travel and the intellectual challenges. And I’ve been blessed to meet lots of great people. It’s awesome to go to a conference in a faraway place and walk into a room full of friends.
Thanks to all my friends and colleagues for a great 30 year adventure! But, man!, that was fast! Where did the time go? But I’m looking forward to a couple more decades of chemometrics escapades.
BMW
EigenU 2015 Poster Contest Winners
May 23, 2015
Like its predecessors, the 10th Annual Eigenvector University included the Tuesday evening PLS_Toolbox/Solo User poster session. Eight posters, which spanned a wide range of applications, were scrutinized by about 40 attendees. A good time was had by presenters and viewers alike as we enjoyed hors d’oeuvres, beverages and scientific discussion.
Amanda Lines of Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) captured this year’s top prize with “Remote Raman technology for in-situ identification of nuclear tank waste.” The poster revealed how Raman spectroscopy combined with multivariate calibration can be used to analyze surfaces at distances up to 50 feet. Ms. Lines is shown below with her poster and EVRI Vice-President Neal B. Gallagher.
In a very close contest the runner up Anna Klimkiewicz of the University of Copenhagen presented “A chemometric approach to the optimization of bio-industrial processes.” The work illustrated the application of multivariate analysis to understand and improve performance in an industrial-scale continuous enzyme purification process. Ms. Klimkiewicz can be seen with her poster (and me) below.
Both of these posters clearly presented an interesting story and made especially good use of our PLS_Toolbox. As a reward for their efforts Amanda took home a pair of Bose Noise Canceling Headphones while Anna took home a Bose Bluetooth Speaker system. Well deserved! 👍 We hope you enjoy them.
Thanks to everybody who attended and presented at EigenU!
BMW