Cairn Research Ltd. is an independent scientific instruments manufacturer based in Faversham, Kent, in the UK. We mainly produce instrumentation for fast, sensitive fluorescence measurements, and related optical techniques such as flash photolysis and luminescence. Our customers are typically bioscience researchers in prestigious institutions, and their input has encouraged our expansion into experimentally related areas, such as electrophysiology, with our innovative Optopatch patch clamp amplifier.

The company was established in 1985 by Dr Martin Thomas, who had previously combined his interests in research and commerce by accepting an offer to join an industrial research laboratory. Martin's industrial experiences led him to believe that a small company with a “can-do” philosophy, unimpeded by external interference, could compete effectively with much larger organisations. Thus Cairn was conceived, and to meet the requirement of independence, the business has always been self-financing. We purchased our first commercial premises in 1989 and have recently taken proud ownership of a working farm where we have converted several barns into high quality design and production workspace.

Cairn has a very active R&D programme, and we are assisted in this by the use of professional development software for specialist design work. We have workstations running: Vutrax for electronic design and component layout; Zemax for optical design and development; and SolidEdge for 3D modelling and drafting. To complement this we have in-house mechanical engineering facilities, which are used extensively for both research and development and custom design projects. The nature of our research programme helps us to provide the best possible customer support, as it is usually possible to speak to the person who actually designed a product or system to answer questions or solve problems.

In addition to manufacturing our own proprietary research equipment we are experienced in providing complete integrated systems based around our hardware and high quality components from other suppliers. We have good working relationships with the top manufacturers of research microscopes, and are happy to supply and install microscopes from Olympus, Nikon and Zeiss. In the fluorescence imaging field we work with companies including Andor Biosciences, Chroma Inc., Roper Scientific, Hamamatsu, IonOptix and RedShirt Imaging to provide comprehensive solutions. We guarantee that whether you choose to buy a single component or an entire system from Cairn, you will get the same high level of service and support. Why deal with us?

* We design and build equipment ourselves, so we can ensure that our products are optimised for carrying out the tasks that you actually want them to do.
* Although we can (and obviously like to) provide complete solutions we also ensure that all our components will work as seamlessly as possible with your existing equipment and software.
* Flexibility. Leading-edge science often requires custom equipment and we are happy to modify existing products or develop new ones to fulfil your needs.
* Being self-financing, we do not get drained of our profits by money-hungry banks or outside shareholders, so we can plough the savings straight back into lower prices and into our extensive R&D program.
* If you have any questions or problems, or in the event (unlikely, of course!) that the equipment goes wrong, you can talk directly to the people who actually designed and built it.
* This allows us to offer a fast and low-cost maintenance and repair service to our global customer base, since we can fix everything here in only a day or two. We also enjoy travel and regularly visit labs throughout the world to install or service equipment.
* We're friendly and helpful, send us an email or give us a call and find out for yourself.