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 Post subject: where can I learn how to use FTIR
PostPosted: Mon Oct 10, 2011 6:04 pm 
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hi
I would like to learn how to use FTIR instrument or Rama
Could you guys tell me where should I go
Now I am in London
thanks


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 Post subject: Re: where can I learn how to use FTIR
PostPosted: Mon Oct 10, 2011 10:28 pm 
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You could go to a university and take a course in analytical chemistry , or instrumentation.
These are usually not entry level courses. They are usually junior (third year of university) level or higher. More typically graduate school level though today anything goes. A fancy high school of science might have one.

You might be able to get a company that sells these instruments to teach you but they
normally only want to work with people who might actually buy their gear.

Both types of instrumentation are made by Bruker ,, Thermo-Nicolet,, and Perkin-Elmer. FTIRs are also made by ABB Bomem and Mattson. Raman Instruments are built by Renishaw,, and Horiba Jobin-Yvon. (and all by others I am forgetting) If you contact these companies, where you are, you might be able to bribe a local sales rep, into teaching you something about how to use the instruments.

These are not techniques for beginners. You should have had at least two years of Chemistry courses and some Physics as well as perhaps some electronics background.
Finally you should have some experience with UV Visible and Fluorescence spectroscopy. And some microscopy experience too. (If the instrumentation you are using has a microscope attached) All on top of some gemological education. Both techniques spit out wiggly lines that are very difficult to interpret.
You need to have some idea what you are looking at or have a library of spectra of what you expect to come your way.

There are some public databases of spectra for both techniques.


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 Post subject: Re: where can I learn how to use FTIR
PostPosted: Tue Oct 11, 2011 3:51 am 
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Thu wrote:
hi
I would like to learn how to use FTIR instrument or Rama
Could you guys tell me where should I go
Now I am in London
thanks



SSEF Basel (Swiss)
they have classes on Advanced Gemology.

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 Post subject: Re: where can I learn how to use FTIR
PostPosted: Tue Oct 11, 2011 4:16 am 
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yeah, have a look here: http://www.ssef.ch/education/expert-cou ... gy-course/

ciao and welcome to the forum
alberto

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 Post subject: Re: where can I learn how to use FTIR
PostPosted: Tue Oct 11, 2011 8:20 am 
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thanks mate
I really would like to take the course like "SSEF Advanced Training Class" and "SSEF Scientific Gemmology course"
But i am not British
I could have some problem with visa
any idea in the UK
I am GG from GIA "London"
they didn't train me how to determine treatment and origin
i would like to take advance gemological course
thanks


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 Post subject: Re: where can I learn how to use FTIR
PostPosted: Tue Oct 11, 2011 9:01 am 
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Have you started to put coins aside for SSEF course Albé ?

One possibility to get quality consultation for specific need is to contact Thomas Hainschwang at Gemlab Liechtenstein.

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 Post subject: Re: where can I learn how to use FTIR
PostPosted: Tue Oct 11, 2011 11:20 am 
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mikko wrote:
Have you started to put coins aside for SSEF course Albé ?


i'm tempted, neverthless it would be an issue to explain to my wife a 4000 Euro expense for a week gemmo course.......seriously, i have some collegues which invited me to play with some fancy toys..... i still didn't accepted their invitation, maybe i fear to fall in love with a gear out of my pocket possibilities........ :lol:

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One possibility to get quality consultation for specific need is to contact Thomas Hainschwang at Gemlab Liechtenstein.


it would be cool but i doubt he could have time for that....... :roll:

ciao
albé

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 Post subject: Re: where can I learn how to use FTIR
PostPosted: Tue Oct 11, 2011 11:58 am 
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Hi Thu

they do a gemmology degree course at kinston university in London I think you have to be a FGA but maybe they'd allow a gg to enroll?...ask at the gem A


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 Post subject: Re: where can I learn how to use FTIR
PostPosted: Tue Oct 11, 2011 12:12 pm 
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In my opinion it would be a waste of money to take a course in FTIR and Raman
for thousands of dollars or euros.

The people at places like SSEF and GIA research labs and similar sites that use these gear all have advanced degrees in chemistry or geology or earth science. This is what gives them the background and hope to interpret the nasty little squiggles that these instruments output.

Where I work we have a brand new, top of the line, state of the art Bruker, FTIR and Raman microscopes. We got them in the spring. And just yesterday the Professor who is in charge of them proudly showed me a trace he got on the Raman. The specimen was a student made mix of a liquid nitrogen temperature superconductor. The piece was a not very homogenous US quarter sized pressed disc. Even though he has had a Bruker FTIR in his lab for years and is familiar with the OPUS software that runs both it has taken a long time to get comfortable with these instruments. This guy is a full Professor who got the title young because he is a tireless worker and smart. Always in the lab. And he was beaming because he finally got something out of this expensive piece of gear. This one is supposed to be easy to use. It is not. None of them are.

They output squiggly lines. You have to be a spectroscopist to interpret them. You can't learn that in a week. It takes more like ten years. You have to go and work somewhere where they are in daily use. We hope to use ours to try and categorize clay potsherds and flint arrow and spear tips from pre European ,native, inhabitants of the US. It remains to be seen whether that can actually be done.

The analogous background work for gemology seems to me to be rather jealously guarded by those that have already done it. They don't want to give their secrets away for free or help arm their competitors. The stuff only dribbles into the scientific literature in small amounts from what I have seen.


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 Post subject: Re: where can I learn how to use FTIR
PostPosted: Tue Oct 11, 2011 2:45 pm 
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I see your point
thanks for guiding me
I am quite new in gemological field
but I still would like to learn how to determine treatments and origin of the gems especially in big 3.
any suggestion is welcome
may be reference books
thanks


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 Post subject: Re: where can I learn how to use FTIR
PostPosted: Tue Oct 11, 2011 6:13 pm 
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Seems like you may be putting the cart before the horse a wee bit.

A solid background in general gemology might be a good place to start, unless you already have an advanced degree in geochemistry and/or geophysics.


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 Post subject: Re: where can I learn how to use FTIR
PostPosted: Tue Oct 11, 2011 6:50 pm 
Barbra Voltaire wrote:
Seems like you may be putting the cart before the horse a wee bit.

A solid background in general gemology might be a good place to start, unless you already have an advanced degree in geochemistry and/or geophysics.

Agreed.
In a previous incarnation, we used to make a system that displayed wiggly lines that, to the 'cognoscenti', allowed the capture of spectral activity that was agile in the time domain (think frequency hopping or occupying a spectrum frequency slot for seconds only, never to return to that same slot.

We sold only to sensible govt agencies and offered 5 or 10 day training courses in association with the purchase of our system. *However* the only operators we would get to train were those already with a successful minimum of 3 years basic training in the uses and abuses of the electro-magnetic spectrum and then 3-5 years experience in the same. There was no way we could teach 'ab initio' what a newcomer would need to know, and for his interpretation of the data our system produced, to be relied on. What we could - and did - do, was to take a person already trained and experienced in spectrum capture and analysis and, in 5-10 days, show them how to apply their knowledge to our specific system and to obtain the extra benefits it provided.

As someone now watching carefully developments in the FTIR/Raman field, I have here a strong sense of deja vu. Anyone buying a Raman 'scope (etc) and then buying a 5 day course in its use. is, at best, going to be left floundering and at worst become a 'loose cannon' - unless they already have a firm grasp of the elementals of this form of spectrum interpretation and it real limitations whan applied to *gemmology*.

With particular regard to Barbra's point, whatever my background knowledge and experience of spectrum interpretation may be, it's going to be at least another year or so of gaining *gemmological* knowledge - plus experience - before I can reasonably consider venturing into this complex field.


Last edited by Kerensky on Wed Oct 12, 2011 8:39 am, edited 1 time in total.

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 Post subject: Re: where can I learn how to use FTIR
PostPosted: Wed Oct 12, 2011 3:38 am 
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Thu wrote:
but I still would like to learn how to determine treatments and origin of the gems especially in big 3.
any suggestion is welcome
may be reference books


one of the best method for treatments id remains microscope inclusions observation, it can be a very powerful gun in skilled gemologist's hands. besides formal base training, Practice and a good collection of reference books are required tough.
about books i strongly suggest: Photoatlas of inclusions in gemstones vol 1 and 3 (if u are interested in big three only...), there are others but these 2 are essential.

Barbra Voltaire wrote:
Seems like you may be putting the cart before the horse a wee bit.


Agree, a solid gemmo education base is requred and it's the minimum, Let's start your home building from the foundation.... :wink:

Kerensky wrote:
...'cognoscenti',...


the correct spelling is "conoscenti"..... sorry Owen, couldn't resist..... :lol:

ciao
alberto

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 Post subject: Re: where can I learn how to use FTIR
PostPosted: Wed Oct 12, 2011 4:23 am 
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Quote:
i'm tempted, neverthless it would be an issue to explain to my wife a 4000 Euro expense for a week gemmo course.......


I dreamed about the course too, but then realized it could be very sad feeling to come home with all that skill and then look at my "empty" desk :cry:

Quote:
I am GG from GIA "London"

Quote:
A solid background in general gemology might be a good place to start,


GG "London" is not solid foundation for asking about advanced gemology ???

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 Post subject: Re: where can I learn how to use FTIR
PostPosted: Wed Oct 12, 2011 5:03 am 
Alberto wrote:
Kerensky wrote:
...'cognoscenti',...


the correct spelling is "conoscenti"..... sorry Owen, couldn't resist..... :lol:

ciao
alberto


Friend Albe,
I am the first to admit that my posts are freely littered with typos - but that is not one of them. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/cognoscenti. 'Origin: 1770–80; < Italian, Latinized variant of conoscente (present participle of conoscere to know).' :lol:

Languages often borrow from each other and frequently change either or both in spelling and range of meaning. Another easy example is the English 'cow'; this is the changed form of the Old German 'Kuh', that is still so spelled in modern German. That word adoption dates back to when Angles, Saxons and Jutes were raping my great x60 - grandmothers and stealing this land.


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