Wavelength dispersive spectrometer and energy dispersive spectrometer automation: Past and future development

As part of the Microbeam Analysis Society (MAS) symposium marking 50 years of electron microprobe analysis, this article reviews the important advance s made over the decades to the automation of data collection and computeriz ed analysis of data from the electron microprobe. Out of many innovations t hat contributed to the advance of microprobe automation, we have chosen to focus on a few developments that the authors feel represent the major trend s in advancement of the "state of the art" of this instrumentation. After p roviding brief summaries of the three generations of advances in the hardwa re and software of automation systems, several key applications development s are described, followed by our prediction of which current developments m ay impact the future automation of the microprobe.