By Mike Gottschalk

Michael Pickering got the idea for Trione on his first day as a research chemist at Durrum Instruments back in 1976. While they were showing him their Amino Acid analysis instrument they opened the refrigerator to reveal the eluents and reagents in their reservoirs. One solution was red. He asked, “What’s the red stuff?” The reply was that it was the ninhydrin reagent. He asked, “Why is it red, ninhydrin isn’t red!” The answer was no one knew. He said, show me the instrument later, take me to documents, “I want to see the formula for the ninhydrin.” Seeing the formula reveal that Stan Moore’s recipe included Dimethylsulfoxide (DMSO) as the essential water miscible organic solvent. While DMSO is a great solvent, it’s also reactive, and responsible for the secondary reactions that lead to the background red color.

Before join Durrum Instruments Michael had followed the work of George Olah in Carbonium ion chemistry. He’s the guy who developed “magic acid” which could protonate methane to make CH₅+. His solvent of choice was sulfolane, a water miscible, non-reactive organic solvent.

The idea was born. However, Durrum Instruments had no interest in making consumables. The company where he next worked was Spectra Physics which also had no interest in making consumables. But on his starting interview with personal he was required to list his ideas that he thought were patentable. Number one was Trione.

Early on, he enlisted the help of Bertum Russel, a chemistry patent attorney to get the patent for Trione. Bertum’s conditions were “If you think you’re going to make money by licensing this I won’t waste your money, but if you are going to make it, I’ll get you a patent.”

That same year, Michael contacted Stan Moore at Rockefeller University to get his assessment after using Trione. Afterall, what better way to start a business than to have the endorsement of one of the researchers who developed the original ninhydrin. Stan said, “You should do well with this but I have post-docs making ninhydrin for me every day so I won’t need to buy it.”

Undeterred, Michael gave seminars and workshops thought the analytical community and soon acceptance by the analytical chemists made Trione the best in class ninhydrin for Amino Acid analysis it is today.

This year’s Pittcon was held in Chicago, Illinois from March 3-6.

The overwhelming theme of this meeting was COLD. Winter was still very present in Chicago that week with temperatures dropping well below freezing.

But despite the cold, there was a good turnout and it was a successful show. As usual, we had on hand our Pinnacle PCX and our post-column applications. We also had our FREESTYLE Sample Cleanup system. This is always a great show for meeting distributors, suppliers, customers. Nowadays Pittcon is as much (if not more) about networking and meetings as it is about finding new equipment.

We usually try to find some adventure or other on the Sunday before the show starts, and this year was no exception. This year, we braved the cold and the snow to venture out to Gary, Indiana!  Before Pittcon, this editor had visited 45 of the 50 US States. Indiana was one of 5 remaining.

The requirements for the day were: 1) easy to get to without a car 2) be located outside the city limits of Chicago and 3) have a restaurant/bar close to the train station.  After some internet research, the 18th Street Brewery in Gary, IN seemed to fit the bill perfectly!

We took the South Shore Line from McCormick Place  out to Gary, where we trudged through a foot of snow to the 18th Street Brewery.  It turns out this is a wonderful brewery with good beer and friendly folks. And they even had a grill out back which was cooking up kielbasa sausage with kimchi. If you’re ever in Chicago and need a change of pace, or are in northern Indiana, it’s worth a stop.

All in all it was a good trip and a successful meeting. But I’m glad Pittcon 2015 will be in New Orleans…