The Unversity of Ottawa is pleased to invite qualified proponents to submit a proposal for a Slide Scanner to perform High Resolution Automated Petrographic Analysis.
General Description:
An automated slide scanner for imaging and digitising thin sections in petrographic analysis is required. The slide scanner will be housed in the new Ore Deposit Petrology Laboratory (ODPL) at the University of Ottawa. The laboratory will be dedicated to the petrological characterization of ore mineralized rocks, with specific capacity in reflected light characterization, sample visualization and rapid throughput for mineralogical screening. The focus will be on platinum-group metal (PGM)-bearing phases and rocks, but the analysis of a much wider array of base- and precious metal mineralized samples will be possible too. Key capabilities of the ODPL will be (1) visualizing and analyzing multiple thin sections from the same hand sample quickly and effectively in looking for PGM; (2) image to smaller (10s of nm) length-scales in reflected light optical microscopy than possible before; (3) rapid compositional screening of PGM assemblages; and (4) isolating and separating PGM populations from bulk rocks. The slide scanner requested will be particularly relevant for stages 1 and 3 of the workflow outlined above.
The automated slide scanner must be automated, have a precision scanning stage, and be capable of imaging multiple thin sections in one sequence. The slide scanner must be able to operate in transmitted and reflected (bright field) light modes. Transmitted light, plane polarized, cross polarized and circular polarized light settings must all be present, and the polarizers must be rotatable to give a virtual petrographic microscope stage. A range of objective lens (5x, 10x, 20x etc.) will facilitate high resolution image collection across multiple length scales. A high performance microscope camera will facilitate the collection of high quality color images that will be used for subsequent qualitative and quantitative analysis. A high performance workstation (computer system) is required to handle the large datasets that will be generated. The system should come with bespoke or compatible software to support multi-channel image acquisition, 2D stitching, multi-plane Z-stack imaging, quantitative image analysis and machine learning.
Specifications listed in Appendix A – Technical Specifications Compliance Form of this RFP are the mandatory minimum requirements for the Slide Scanner for High Resolution Automated Petrographic Analysis.
Mandatory Minimum Requirements for the Slide Scanner to perform High Resolution Automated Petrographic Analysis:
1.0 - Digital petrographic slide scanner
1.1 - The slide scanner must have the capability to automatically image 12 slides or more continuously, with continuous loading of slides even during scanning procedure
1.2 - The imaging station must be fully enclosed
1.3 - The slide scanner must be able to use polarisation contrast optics and image in plane-polarised light, cross polarised light and circular polarised light
1.4 - The slide scanner must be able to image in reflected (bright field) light
1.5 - The polarisers must be rotatable, to create a virtual rotatable microscope stage
1.6 - The following are the minimum slide holder requirements, allowing for standard thin section dimensions used in optical microscopy:
- 3 slide holders that can hold 4 26x76mm slides each
- 2 slide holders that can hold 2 52x76mm slides each
- 1 slide holder that can hold 1 28x48mm slide
1.7 - The slide scanner must come equipped with a set of high quality objective lenses corrected for flatness of field and optimised for being used with brightfield and fluorescent light, as well as polarised transmitted light. A range of magnifications must be offered and the resolutions achievable with the 10x, 20x and 40x objective lens must be 0.35 µm, 0.18 µm and 0.09 µm per pixel, respectively, or better
1.8 - The slide scanner must have the following technical specifications (or better, if relevant):
- Motorised and polarised condensor with appropriate (motorised adjustable) numerical aperture depending on objective being used, working distance and capability to work in plane-, cross- and circular-polarised light
- Z drive with 3 mm travel
- Z drive with 10 nm step size
- Scanning surface of 300 x 100 mm
- TIE contrast or DIC equivalent
- Directly coupled, with no fibre optic
- Bar code reading (>= 40 different standard 1D and 2D bar codes) and optical character recognition (OCR; with >= 21 Standard Optical Characters)
- Automatic calibrations of the intensity of each FL LED for reproducibility
- LED light source for brightfield and fluorescence imaging, with four independent LEDs
- Equipped with a filter turret of 10 cubes for fluorescent cubes and contrast imaging
2.0 - Color Camera
2.1 - A high-performance microscopy camera is required, with the following technical specifications, or better:
- 5 megapixels
- Binning factor of 1x1 to 5x5
- 60 frames per second @ 5 megapixels
- Cooling to 18 degC
- USB 3.0
- Pixel size of 3.45 µm
3.0 - Computer and software
3.1 - The operating software must be Windows 10 compatible and 64 bit, and must be able to, at a minimum:
- Control the microscope
- Control the fluorescent light source
- Allow interactive measurements
- Allow automated multi channel fluorescence
- Allow panorama stitching
- Allow manual extended focus
- Allow deconvolution
- Allow Z stacking
- Allow interactive rotation of the polarized light image, to create a virtual microscope stage
- Allow creation of automatic measurement programs, including application of segmentation and object separation algorithms, geometrical and intensity measurements, hierarchical and zone-of-influence measurements
- Batch process to produce data tables and images with embedded measurement data
3.2 - The slide scanner system must be accompanied by a high performance computer workstation appropriate for running the software described in 3.1 above.
4.0 - Other
4.1 - Must include minimum of 1 full year standard manufacturer’s warranty.
4.2 - Must include installation and on-site training.
4.3 - All electrical components must have CSA (Canadian Standards Association) certification, or accepted equivalent as per Electrical Safety Authority Recognized Certification Mark at the following link: https://esasafe.com/electricalproducts/recognized-certification-marks/
Otherwise, all electrical components must be able to undergo the appliable electrical inspection, and/or, certification, without voiding the system warranty.
