Santa Clara, CA (OBBeC) - Agilent Technologies has announced that it has acquired the Nano Instruments business unit of MTS Systems. According to Agilent, the acquisition will strengthen its portfolio of instrumentation for imaging, characterizing and quantifying nanomechanical material properties. Financial details were not disclosed.

Based in Oak Ridge, Tenn., Nano Instruments is a supplier of nanoindentation systems and related equipment as well as supporting software. The G200 and G300 nanoindentation systems and the Nano UTM (Universal Testing Machine) system are used in applications such as verifying the structural integrity of semiconductor devices, coatings and thin films. Nano Instruments’ customers are typically academic and industrial researchers involved in materials sciences, semiconductor and life sciences.

Nanoindentation is an adjacent market to atomic force microscopy; Agilent currently sells atomic force microscopes (AFMs). Both nanoindentation systems and AFMs are used to measure and characterize materials for hardness, elasticity and viscosity at the nanometer scale; research laboratories that use AFMs typically have a nanoindentation system in close proximity.

The Nano Instruments business is joining Agilent’s Materials Science Solutions Unit, within Agilent’s Life Sciences and Chemical Analysis business. The unit was formed in 2007 under the leadership of Mike Gasparian, vice president and general manager. MSSU’s focus is to provide microscopy, particle analysis and optical spectroscopy solutions for the materials testing, life sciences and chemical analysis markets, as well as to advance nanotechnology.