Why a laboratory Data Acquisition System

A modern Data Acquisition System overcomes the limits of traditional stand-alone instrumentation already present in laboratories, mainly dedicated to solving a single specific task or a single measurement. Having a Data Acquisition System, on the other hand, allows the collection, storage and processing of a large amount of heterogeneous information in a safe and efficient manner , which are detected through a network of sensors and subsequently managed and made available through specific software solutions.

A Data Acquisition System, therefore, is the perfect tool for all companies that need to carry out one or more types of measurements and to manage the collected data in the simplest and most effective way .

How a Data Acquisition System works

A Data Acquisition System is an articulated system, composed of a chain of components that perform measurements, digitize the data collected and store them for their future use.

Its function is therefore to “translate” physical information, detectable by sensors, into digital information , which can be managed by a PC and subsequently used to make strategic decisions. To achieve this result, at least four different types of components are required:

1. Sensors , necessary to describe the physical phenomenon of interest and transform it into a digitizable electrical quantity
2. Signal conditioning , to process and adapt the signal detected by the sensors (which is filtered, amplified and linearized)
3. Analog-to-digital converter, to transform previously conditioned data into digital data
4. Software , to record the data sent by the converter, analyze them, integrate them with other data, archive them, make them available for analysis wherever they are and at any time

A Data Acquisition System therefore starts from a hardware component – sensors – capable of collecting data that are appropriately processed in order to be acquired and managed by software.

The complexity of the system increases according to the number of measurements carried out, the presence of sensors of different types, the speed with which a phenomenon occurs, the need to integrate the data obtained. A Data Acquisition System can become – depending on the needs of the user and the level of development of the software for data processing – a simple or extremely complex system . Consequently it is necessary to design it in such a way that it guarantees extreme flexibility, expandability and a good level of customization.

All the advantages of a Data Acquisition System in the laboratory

A modern Data Acquisition System is therefore able to overcome the limits of traditional stand-alone instrumentation, natively allows communication between heterogeneous measures and has the advantage of being able to be customized, simply by customizing the software application that manages it or by adding hardware modules with different types of inputs and outputs.

This allows you to:

1. Save money : using a single Data Acquisition System allows you to reduce costs for the purchase of individual measuring instruments, but also those relating to the time required to learn their correct use and maintenance .
2. Save space : a Data Acquisition System is designed for industrial use and not just laboratory: this means that it is more robust and decidedly more compact than a long series of separate instruments.
3. Save time : thanks to a Data Acquisition System you can use a single tool – your PC – to process a large amount of different data, easily comparable because they have already been normalized and do not come from tools developed by different companies, each with its own protocol and its own standards. This translates into a clear reduction in the time needed to use the collected data .
4. Be more flexible because a modern acquisition system is nativelymodular. At any time it is possible to choose which modules to activate and which channels to use, modifying them as needed; in addition, it is easy to increase the number of connected devices, which once integrated extend the potential of the system itself.
5. Avoid unexpected events , because all the components used are off-the- shelf,  so available on the market and therefore easily manageable and replaceable in case of need. There are no particular components developed for laboratory applications, so any problem related to hardware or software can be solved in the shortest possible time.
6. Take advantage of a customized tool , because the software is developed based on your needs and can be easily reconfigured, if these needs change over time, without having to replace the rest of the equipment.
7. Take advantage of an easy-to-use tool , because the software interface is graphical and therefore does not require a specific training phase for the operator who uses it. In addition, there is the possibility to develop the interfaces and the reporting system in a customized way, to simplify the user’s activity and precisely manage the type of data to which he has access.

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