Category Archives: Eigenvector News

“Who are those guys?” *

If anybody asks you that about us, we’ve got an answer for them in 16 slides: The Eigenvector Company Profile. It’s a short profile of EVRI, including some information about our company history, software products, personnel, short courses and consulting services.

“Hey, Butch?”
“What?”
“They’re very good.”

BMW

* With apologies to Butch Cassidy.

Eigenvector offers academic discounts on our software and short courses, such as our upcoming Basic Chemometrics in Rome. Everyone, of course, likes a discount, so we get a lot of questions regarding how to qualify as an academic.

If you do a Google search on “definition academic” you’ll come up with quite a few choices. Most of them, like TheFreeDictionary.com, include something to the effect of “Of, relating to, or characteristic of a school, especially one of higher learning.” Based on this, we define academic as degree granting institution. Thus, we do not consider research institutes, such as national laboratories, to be academic, and ask that they pay industrial rates.

There are some other definitions of academic. In particular I like “Scholarly to the point of being unaware of the outside world” and “Theoretical or speculative without a practical purpose or intention.” If you are willing to admit that your institution fits this definition, then I suppose we would give you the academic rate. However, I’d have to see this on letterhead and signed by the laboratory director. I doubt that we’ll find anyone willing to put that in writing, but if we do, I’ll post it here!

BMW

I’m pleased to announce that Eigenvector’s Dr. Charles E. “Chuck” Miller has been elected chair of the 2010 International Diffuse Reflectance Conference, aka the “Chambersburg” Meeting. IDRC has been held every other year since 1982 and is one of the premier conferences on NIR spectroscopy and related fields. It is organized by the Council for Near infrared Spectroscopy, CNIRS.

The 2008 IDRC meeting ran from August 3-8 in its usual location, on the campus of Wilson College in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania. IRDC is organized in a Gordon Conference-like format, with longer talks, moderated discussions, morning and evening sessions, and afternoons off for further scientific exchange or recreation. Chuck will be responsible for organizing the program for the next meeting, to be held in August, 2010.

This year at IDRC Chuck presented “Chemometrics in Process Analytical Technology (PAT)-A Six Sigma Perspective.” When at Dupont, Chuck became a “Six Sigma Green Belt.” His presentation outlines his experience with Six Sigma and explores the relationship between Six Sigma, PAT and chemometrics.

Congratulations to Chuck! We’re sure the 2010 Chambersburg meeting will be a smashing success!

BMW

Wow, what a week!

Fourteen courses, forty students, and eight instructors all in six days. This has to be as much chemometrics as has ever been learnt in one week in one place, ever.

OK, I may be a bit biased, but the third edition of Eigenvector University went really well. Students from as far away as Japan and Kuwait converged on the Washington Athletic Club for a series of basic to advanced chemometrics courses May 4-9, 2008. The entire Eigenvector consulting staff was on hand, plus our associate Rasmus Bro.

The week started on Sunday morning with a full Linear Algebra for Chemometricians class (that’s dedication!) and continued with MATLAB for Chemometricians that afternoon. On Monday, our parallel track of specialty and advanced courses was added with Using PLS_Toolbox and Solo Models On-line.

Evening events included the Tuesday night’s joint EigenU/CPAC Poster Session, Wednesday night’s PLS_Toolbox/Solo PowerUser Tip & Tricks, and the Workshop Dinner at Torchy’s Thursday.

We were pleased to see the attendees get out and enjoy the local terrain. Students explored the waterfront and Pike Place Market, took ferry rides to Bainbridge Island, and enjoyed the workout facilities and spa treatments at the WAC. Friends were made all around.

As usual, the WAC staff took great care of us and kept us well fed. Numerous comments were made about how good the lunches were. Spouses joined many of the workshop participants for the Thursday dinner at Torchy’s, which was the culinary highlight of the week.

Thanks to everyone, students and Eigenvectorians, for making it a fun and informative week!

BMW

This year’s Eigenvector University will be May 4-9. For the this third edition of EigenU we’ll once again be at the posh Washington Athletic Club in beautiful downtown Seattle.

As before, EigenU will include 14 short courses, a poster session (with Apple iPod nanos for the best two posters!), and a conference dinner at Torchy’s. But we do have a number of things that are new this year:

• This year’s Poster Session will be held on the University Washington campus at the UW Club in conjunction with a Center for Process Analytical Chemistry dinner event. This is a chance for EigenU participants to network with CPAC sponsors and faculty.
• We’ve added a new class, PLS_Toolbox/Solo PowerUser Tips & Tricks. This special short course is dedicated to users both old and new who want to get the most out of our software. This Wednesday evening event will include lots of great “how to’s” and dinner.
• With all the new options we’ve added for automating predictions with your multivariate models, we’ve expanded Using PLS_Toolbox/Solo Models On-Line to a full day. Find out how to use Solo_Predictor, Model_Exporter and a host of other options to their best advantage.
• We’ve also expanded Advanced Preprocessing to a full day. Proper data preprocessing is often the key to robust and precise multivariate models.

For complete information, see the EigenU homepage. Our block of rooms at the WAC will be released March 10. Early, (discounted) registration ends March 28, and so make your plans to attend EigenU now!

Thanks!

BMW

Hi Folks:

While dropping off my 15 year-old at school today it occurred to me that, like her, EVRI was now a teenager. Eigenvector Research was founded on January 1, 1995. So I guess that means we turned 13 last month. Yikes!

Teenagers are often associated with mood-swings, disdain for authority, a cynical outlook, and the more than occasional outburst. I hope that’s not us! Well, OK, we do try to maintain a healthy amount of skepticism, and we do certainly let people know what we think–that’s our job as consultants. But the staff of EVRI is also goal-oriented, dedicated, talented, smart, helpful, and easy to get along with (just like my teenager).

I guess its a sign of maturity when you don’t think much about your birthdays. Our history is long enough now that most of our anniversaries are not significant milestones. EVRI is just 13, but between us we have over 100 man-years of chemometrics experience and expertise.

At any rate, you don’t have be afraid of us, just because we’re 13! Give us a call and we promise not to bite your head off. 🙂

BMW

Well, we made it through another EigenU: 6 days, 14 classes and 35 students. Plus, a poster session, a PLS_Toolbox User Group Meeting and a workshop group dinner. Thanks to everybody that came! We hope you enjoy using your new skills, and that they enhance your productivity, aid you in the discovery process, and improve the quality of the products you are involved with. Try to start working with your data as soon as possible. If you do that, you’ll have a new skill that will serve you well the rest of your professional life.

We’d also like to thank the WAC for their hospitality and attention to detail. We really enjoyed the lunches, receptions and dinner. Thanks to Rick Cardona for making the arrangements, and Joshua, James, Danny, Douglas, Kevin and everybody else who took care of us all week.

Next year’s EigenU is tentatively scheduled for April 27-May 2, 2008. We plan to offer a couple new courses, including one in Robust Methods (PLS_Toolbox and Solo include robust PCA and PLS). Until then, you can find us teaching courses at the Federation of Analytical Chemistry and Spectroscopy Societies (FACSS) conference and Eastern Analytical Symposium (EAS).

Thanks again to everybody that came. As usual, we learned a lot from you too. And thanks for testing the next version of PLS_Toolbox. You’ll see that out soon, and thanks to you, it’ll be better than ever!

See you next year, if not before.

BMW

The word “view” has many definitions. One of them is “a scene or vista,” and in fact, the picture at the top of this page is what I see out my office window here in Wenatchee, Washington. The mountains on the left and center are the Stuart range, and on the right you see Mt. Cashmere. I enjoy this view immensely, and the mountains here, along with the lakes and rivers, are a big part of why most of us “Eigenvectorians” are here in Washington.

Another definition of “view” is “an individual and personal perception, judgment, or interpretation; an opinion,” and that is what “The View from Eigenvector” will mostly be about. In this space you can expect to find editorials on the state of the field of chemometrics, announcements about software and staff, discussions of the pros and cons of particular modeling approaches, explanations as to why we do things they way we do here at EvRI, etc.

Thanks for checking in on us!

BMW