Jeremy Hoffman looks at a monitor to track the progress of his work.It's the only way he can see it.The company for which he works, Potomac Photonics, focuses on small things. The company specializes in micro-manufacturing, using a variety of technologies, such as lasers and 3D printers, to create or modify products with ultimate precision, to the size of about a micron, smaller than a speck of dust."We like to say that if you can see it, we didn't do it," said Mike Adelstein, the company's president and CEO.In this case, Hoffman, a 27-year-old research and development engineer in his second year at the company, is working on a microfluidic chip 2.5-inches long by 0.1-inch wide, about the size of a matchstick.Hoffman uses a micromill to create channels in the piece, called a lab-on-a-chip, which companies will use for rapid diagnostics testing devices or research. The channels are 75 microns wide, about the diameter of a human hair, and will allow fluid to pass through them.For this project, Potomac Photonics has a non-disclosure agreement with the client, so Adelstein can't discuss specifics of the product. About 75 percent of the work the company does is covered by similar agreements, Adelstein said, typical in research work to protect intellectual property rights. (An example of a use of a similar pocket-sized device is to test blood to determine within five minutes if someone has a concussion.)For Hoffman, it's another day's work, where no day is the same. The Buffalo, N.Y, native studied physics and chemistry in college and wanted to find a practical use for those skills."You start with a drawing and work your way down through the process of developing programs for machines to run on automatically," he said. "It's an interesting field to apply some of the skills I've learned."From prototypes to production, the company does work for NASA, universities, naval research labs and large electronics companies. About 70 percent of the work Potomac Photonics does is in biotechnology and medical devices."We're working on things that are really changing the world," he said.Potomac Photonics does production work for a company in North Carolina that sends sutures — medical stitches — to Potomac, which then uses lasers to insert small channels in the sutures. Doctors are able to put tiny radiation doses in the channels for localized treatment of breast and prostate cancer.The parts have approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to be marketed and have been used at places such as Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, Adelstein said.The company has also worked with Johns Hopkins University on a project to help create devices for developing countries that can remove pre-cancerous cells linked to cervical cancer.Potomac Photonics is also building a device for a company in Europe that will enable the company to identify early stage cancer cells and come up with ways to read them.These projects have a special place in Adelstein's heart. His wife is a three-time cancer survivor, he said, which has been a motivation."Part of this is a business but part of this is from a social [perspective,]" he said. "From a moral perspective, we really get a lot of joy out of working on things we know are helping other people."The company started in 1982 and Adelstein joined in 1997, a year after he graduated from University of Maryland Baltimore County with a degree in biochemistry. He first joined as a sales administrator. When he saw an opportunity to build out the company's contract manufacturing services, he jumped on it.Now in his 20th year at the company, he enjoys the challenge of finding new ways to do things and develop manufacturing technologies, on a small scale.After the company was purchased by venture capitalist investors in 1999, Adelstein bought out the company in 2012 and moved it to the bwtech@UMBC Research and Technology Park in 2014, where he plans to keep the company for the long haul. He wanted to return to his alma mater because he believes in the area's future.The research park is a 71-acre campus just south of Catonsville and Arbutus that is home to nearly 100 companies. With the facilities and programs that UMBC and the Community College of Baltimore County offer, Adelstein thinks the area will become a hotbed for manufacturing technology.The company also lets universities and research institutions use some of its technology for a fraction of what it would charge commercial customers, as part of its education manufacturing initiative."There's really a lot of resources and investment that are going on in this area right here to develop new advanced manufacturing technologies. I think there's a great opportunity for this region to continue to grow."Larry Letow, chairman emeritus of the Tech Council of Maryland, the largest technology trade association in the state, and president and CEO of Convergence Technology Consulting, said the cyber community has started to drive business in the area. Over the last five years, the area has changed dramatically from an area known for services to one known for manufacturing.He credits the $2.7 billion sale of Sourcefire, a Columbia-based network security hardware and software developer to Cisco Systems Inc., in July 2013, for bringing attention to the region. Combining that with people with creative ideas coming in and colleges helping fund innovation, he sees more possibility for manufacturing and product-development businesses in Catonsville and Arbutus."When you can get one company to get that billion-dollar mark, people notice," he said. "There's a lot of money coming in this area. Once you get a couple successes, people are willing to find ways to get you money for what you want to build or innovate."Potomac Photonics, with a staff of 24, is growing at rate of about 20 percent a year in revenue and is projected to make $3 million through commercial projects."We feel like we're on the cutting edge in so many different areas and that's the best part of what we're doing," Adelstein said. "Everyone enjoys the work. It's a very independent environment where people are able to be creative."Mike Davis, the company's vice president of manufacturing, has been with Potomac Photonics for 17 years. He enjoys the challenge trying to figure out how to create products from little more than an idea,trying to get past issues with manufacturing that people may not have done before.Knowing his work helps make a difference is rewarding, Davis said."All the work we do may seem a bit monotonous and mundane," he said. "We're just drilling holes, albeit extremely small holes you can't do conventionally. It's always nice to know there's a greater cause there that we're contributing to."