Conclusions
The Open AUC Project presented here is a serious and timely attempt, driven by users, to advance the versatile and valuable AUC method from a 20-year hiatus of technological advancements to a state-of-the-art technology. Such development is crucial for the survival of this classical method, which even after more than 75 years of intense hydrodynamic research still offers room for the introduction of new experimental methods—multiphase osmotic pressure determination is just one recent example (Page et al. 2008). A significant obstacle to innovation has been the dependence of the user community on a single ultracentrifuge platform, which requires feeding of light and electronics into the vacuum chamber of the ultracentrifuge. To eliminate this obstacle, the Open AUC Project can now facilitate the development of a common open source hardware platform, detectors, and software, freely available to anyone. Once a CFA AUC has been acquired, detector modules can be added and exchanged by the user at will. The proposed modular and open source software architecture further encourages development and provides a clear pathway for innovation. Communication will be performed over TCP/IP communications, and all data can be saved in an efficient relational database. By adopting a GPL license, we can assure that the technology developed finds broad implementation and we can guarantee that any intellectual property will remain freely available to any user. Due to the modular design of the Open AUC Project, data from XL-based ultracentrifuges (Beckman Coulter) can also be integrated into the proposed Open AUC Project data handling and analysis structure. Thus, the Open AUC Project will be beneficial for any AUC user regardless if a CFA or XL-I is used as hardware platform. Any data acquired by the instrumentation will be made available in a portable ASCII format to guarantee data exchange compatibility with third party software.