Raman spectrometers use tightly focused beams to produce high resolution spectra, but fail at analysing heterogeneous substances because they cannot spatially target all components. Orbital Raster Scan (ORS™) increases the interrogation area on a sample while maintaining high spectral resolution. Effervescent cold medicines, for example, contain many active ingredients in each heterogeneous tablet. Traditional identification and verification techniques require the collection of several spectra at different points on the tablet. Mira spectrometers equipped with ORS capture a large interrogation area in a very short time, analysing all of the ingredients in a single scan.
For this Application Note spectra were first acquired with the ORS OFF, illustrating spectral variance when sampling a heterogeneous sample. These spectra were averaged and compared to a single spectrum acquired with the ORS ON, to demonstrate the quality and convenience of a single ORS scan. A final experiment provides an example of how two competing effervescent cold medicines may be compared using Mira P with ORS technology and verification supported by p-values.
