EC-Lab^®

Whether you are a die-hard EC-Lab^® user or a scientist curious to know more about BioLogic’s benchmark control/analysis software, this first in a series of articles on EC-Lab^® will be of interest to you.

Only on EC-Lab^®: The functionality helping scientists across the globe

Modify on the fly:

Planning and executing your measurements should not be difficult. But in actuality many potentiostat interfaces are extremely inflexible, requiring careful pre-planning and once the process has started, it is generally not possible to adapt or change settings. This can impede progress and stunt research, but the flexibility that will really help your research, for example changing the cut-off voltage of a battery charge, or changing the vertex voltage for Cyclic Voltammetry, or applied voltage during an electrolysis experiment is built into EC-Lab^®.
Modify on the fly is unique to BioLogic. You don’t need to plan. You can modify your experiment as you go, giving you more flexibility and control – both of which can help you progress your research.

Ethernet access and remote management

We live in a world where the Internet plays a vital part in our everyday lives, whether this be on a personal or a professional level. However, EC-Lab^® is currently the only control and analysis software that enables you to control your potentiostat remotely and/or share your instrument’s channels via multiple PCs or share multiple instruments from your PC. The benefits of this are obvious. You can work more easily as a team and get the most out of your potentiostat channels as well as facilitate group projects.
The Ethernet connectivity makes the EC-Lab^® solution the perfect multiuser workstation.

Data of interest

Although electrochemistry is just a combination of time, current, charge, cycle & voltage, knowing how to convert raw data into meaningful information is incredibly important. In EC-Lab^® and BT-Lab^® techniques can be automated, saving you valuable time and helping you to identify key data of interest such as battery cycle life, Coulombic efficiency, capacity, Ohmic drop, and dQ/dV, etc.
BioLogic’s data of interest functionality guides you straight to the information you need.

At a glance…

• Technique filter guides you to the proper technique
• Full battery cell control for a holistic measurement
• Fully automated process for ascertaining battery life cycle data
• Increased precision/reduced lead time
• Electrochemical Impedance Spectroscopy (EIS)
• Thermal control with TCU software to program climate chambers

For more information on data of interest visit data of interest on the Learning Center

Autonomous instruments for optimum reliability and safety

Your data and your cell are extremely important, and so the reliability of your instruments is critical. This is why the architecture used in BioLogic instruments has been designed with the highest level of robustness in mind

Our electrochemical workstations are based on architecture that offers a channel board which is not just independent from other channel boards, but also from the computer. Indeed, embedded software or firmware is loaded onto each channel. This firmware manages the channel, ensuring that the channel is performing the correct measurement you set up from the computer with EC-Lab^® software. The embedded smart firmware also manages how the data is sampled. More information available in this article.

Even more critical is the reliability of the measurement, i.e. how the cell is managed. What happens if there is an issue with the computer? Is the experiment stopped or is a random set point applied? With BioLogic instruments, measurements will continue based on the settings loaded on the channel board and, more specifically, the safety limit (see text box below) will be checked at every timebase.

This is especially relevant for long-term measurements taken over weeks or months, which is typical for battery testing equipment or battery ageing.

Safety first
With BioLogic instruments, it is possible to set safety limits. As opposed to the conditional limits found in the technique itself, which allow you to set up very complex experiments, this limit is valid during the whole procedure for each linked technique.
When a safety limit is triggered, the measurements are paused. The user may resume the experiment or not, depending on the status of the cell. Different variables can be set as a safety limit, voltage current, charge and the variables measured through the analog inputs. Typically, high and lower voltages, and temperature are recommended for high energy devices such as batteries, fuel cells, RFBs, and supercapacitor measurements.
Thus embedded intelligence allows you to put safety first.

Constantly evolving

BioLogic is constantly adding new functionality to EC-Lab^®. We offer multiple upgrades to our clients each and every year. But as we all know, quality is every bit as important (if not more important) than quantity.
And though there are “standard” updates relating to bug fixes, which you would expect to receive from any software developer, BioLogic goes much further than just fixing issues or improving code quality.
Take the example of the latest version of EC-Lab^® there was a vast array of new innovative functionality embedded in this version, which helps scientists improve the quality of their measurements, gain deeper analytical insights and work more quickly and efficiently. BioLogic’s ethos is that the potentiostat can only ever be as powerful as the software that runs it. And we want the best for our clients.

Ergonomics

EC-Lab^® has a reputation for being simple to use. BioLogic’s extensive development time invests significant man hours in making the user process as simple, and as streamlined, as possible. it is easy to set up very complex procedures (involving many different types of control and limits, coupled with additional devices, and managing several channels) but also incredibly quick to set up a basic measurement.
It’s simple to use and it’s powerful. It’s constantly evolving.
Why would you want to use any other control/analysis interface?