The SPC file format is a

file format A file format is a Computer standard, standard way that information is encoded for storage in a computer file. It specifies how bits are used to encode information in a digital storage medium. File formats may be either proprietary format, pr ...

for storing

spectroscopic Spectroscopy is the field of study that measures and interprets electromagnetic spectra. In narrower contexts, spectroscopy is the precise study of color as generalized from visible light to all bands of the electromagnetic spectrum. Spectrosc ...

data. The SPC file format is a file format in which all kinds of spectroscopic data, including among others infrared spectra, Raman spectra and UV/VIS spectra. The format can be regarded as a

database In computing, a database is an organized collection of data or a type of data store based on the use of a database management system (DBMS), the software that interacts with end users, applications, and the database itself to capture and a ...

with records of variable length and each record stores a different kind of data (instrumental information, information on one spectrum of a dataset, the spectrum itself or extra logs). It was invented by Galactic Industries as generic file format for its programs. Their original specification was implemented in 1986, but a more versatile format was created in 1996. Galactic Industries was purchased by Thermo Fisher Scientific who now maintain and develop the GRAMS Software Suite for which the format was defined. They provide free tools and libraries to allow developers to create and maintain SPC files consistently. This file format is not in plaintext, such as XML or CSV, but is a binary format and is therefore not readable with a standard text editor but requires a special reader or software to interpret the file data. The

Environmental Protection Agency Environmental Protection Agency may refer to the following government organizations: * Environmental Protection Agency (Queensland), Australia * Environmental Protection Agency (Ghana) * Environmental Protection Agency (Ireland) * Environmenta ...

publishes a free spectra reader called ShowSPC that is open to the public for reading spectra data. Additionally, a company AnalyzeIQ produces a free SPC to CSV converter aptly titled SPC2CSV, an open-source project OpenSpectralWorks is an alternative free reader, as well as SpectraGryph which has analytic and display capabilities for reading SPC files. The Essential FTIR software offers a file reader that can read, display, analyze and export .spc files as well as many other spectroscopy file formats.

References

{{reflist

External links

Python module to read and convert SPC files
on GitHub
hyperSpec

R (programming language) R is a programming language for statistical computing and Data and information visualization, data visualization. It has been widely adopted in the fields of data mining, bioinformatics, data analysis, and data science. The core R language is ...

package on GitHub Computer file formats Spectroscopy