Andover, MA – January 26, 2017 – MKS Instruments, Inc. (NASDAQ: MKSI) announces that its Spectra-Physics^® business unit introduces InSight^® X3, the third generation broadly-tunable ultrafast laser system.  The InSight X3 delivers >50% higher power than its industry-leading predecessor, the InSight DS+™.  This new laser system outputs ultrashort pulses and high power over a broad 600 nm tuning range for brighter fluorescence excitation and deeper imaging.  A second infrared beam provides a simultaneous dual-wavelength ultrafast output, perfect for two-color and advanced imaging methods.  InSight X3 is ideal for in vivo, deep tissue imaging in neuroscience, optogenetics, cell biology, and other life science research.

“With its extraordinary performance and capability, the new InSight X3 enables user-friendly, live tissue imaging at dramatically greater depths,” says Julien Klein, senior product marketing manager for Spectra-Physics. “The InSight X3 builds on the highly successful InSight platform with the industry’s largest installed base and used in over 100 peer-reviewed publications.”

The new InSight X3 offers high power levels of >2.0 W at 900 nm, >1.8 W at 1000 nm and >1.6 W at 1100 nm, combined with short pulse widths and integrated dispersion pre-compensation to yield highest peak powers.  A second synchronized beam at 1045 nm with >2.0 W is available for multimodal and advanced imaging techniques, including dual-wavelength simultaneous imaging, optogenetics photo-stimulation, uncaging, second-harmonic and third-harmonic generation (SHG and THG) imaging, coherent anti-Stokes Raman scattering (CARS), and stimulated Raman scattering (SRS) imaging.

InSight X3 builds on the proven InSight product line and has passed extensive environmental testing to ensure high reliability and dependable long-term stability.  The fully automated system can be seamlessly tuned by software to any wavelength within seconds, and the InSight X3 has ideal beam characteristics optimized for multiphoton imaging.

InSight X3 is Spectra-Physics’ second new product introduction in as many days for bio-imaging.  The just announced Spirit HE 1040-30 industrial femtosecond laser coupled with the Spirit-NOPA-VISIR is a high energy tunable source for 3-photon deep tissue imaging.

Spectra-Physics’ InSight X3 laser will be featured at SPIE BIOS and Photonics West, Moscone Center, San Francisco, California, January 28 to February 2, 2017.  Please visit MKS at booth #8722 at SPIE BIOS or booth #1400 at SPIE Photonics West for a demonstration. For more information, please see www.spectra-physics.com/insight-x3.