A very interesting story Gary, but I'll comment on one aspect.
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Originally Posted by gary
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Science has this time honored tradition of build the instrument, do the experiment, report the results....
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This is true but it isn't the whole story. At the 'top end' instruments may be built for one specific purpose and the developers are closely integrated to the science. However a lot of very useful instruments are so versatile and their use so widespread that the inventors and service technicians have very little idea of the uses to which they are put. I'm thinking of things like GC, HPLC, UV-Vis spectroscopy, FTIR, ICP-MS and even IRMS. One GC might be doing quality control in a production facility, another assisting in chemical synthesis while ours is quantifying biomarkers in sediment profiles to assist in palaeoenvironment reconstruction. Our compound-specific IRMS rig was installed by a technician who had used one at the Athens olympics for drug screening whereas our was used to quantify residence time for terrestrial carbon in rivers and estuaries.
Sometimes it's; build instrument with one or two uses in mind and then watch as more and more uses are found for your 'child'.