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LAPRW Wrap-Up

By: Kevin McKeown

In May, Pickering Labs had a chance to exhibit at the LAPRW – Latin America Pesticide Residue Workshop –  in Panama City, Panama!  This was made possible by an invitation from one of our Central American dealers, Analytical Technologies, and we are very grateful for the partnership (and translation services, even though Technical Support Manager David Mazawa’s Spanish is passable!).  Our booth was shared with other companies that Analytical Technologies represents: Agilent and Gerstel. 

The show consisted of many hot topics in the Pesticide Residue testing world, including the continued importance of Glyphosate monitoring.  Pickering Labs has been a leader in Glyphosate/Carbamate analysis for over 30 years, so it certainly gave us a lot to talk about with the attendees!  Some of the more interesting requests that we were asked about were Glyphosate in Honey and in Tomato Leaves.  Using HPLC + Post-Column is not only a long-standing, tried and true way of doing this analysis, but is also completely matrix-independent: making a tricky substance like honey a perfect candidate for our instrumentation.

What would a trip to Panama be without a trip to the canal?!  David and I had a VERY early Sunday morning wakeup call so that we could squeeze in some sightseeing, which included a bicycle tour around “old town” Panama City, where we learned a lot about Manuel Noriega and the completed history of Panama.  The organizing committee for LAPRW put together a wonderful show, which included a performance of traditional dancing, in classical dress, by some of the LAPRW volunteers (truly a full-service group!).  I would be remised if we did not get the attached picture with a pair of the dancers in front of our beautifully-appointed booth.

 

Letter of Authenticity

Pickering Laboratories, Inc. has recently become aware of a concerning issue in regards to copycatting of our products, both Post-Column and PTS (artificial body fluids). We have heard from our international distribution partners that there are inferior manufacturers who are actively looking to misrepresent their products as being produced by Pickering Laboratories, Inc. Some of their tactics include: mimicking our label, copying our company logo and most-brazenly stating that their company has acquired Pickering Labs, Inc.

None of these claims are accurate. In addition, these ‘spoofed’ products are not actually manufactured to the same formulations, nor are they produced with the same quality as Pickering Labs authentic products.

Our authorized dealers in each country can be found at the following website:

https://www.pickeringlabs.com/support/distributor-list/
In addition to being listed on our website, you can request an “Authorized Distributor Certificate” or a “Letter of Authorization” from any dealer to ensure that you are truly getting products manufactured by Pickering Labs.

We encourage any purchases to solely be made through distributors listed on the above link and we would like to thank our partners for bringing this to our attention.

If you, as an international customer or end user of Pickering Labs products, have any hesitancy at all in regards to a purchase we encourage you to contact us directly at: sales@pickeringlabs.com or support@pickeringlabs.com. We will be happy to answer any questions or review a possible source for authenticity.

Quiz #42 – Product Testing Solutions

We are taking a slight detour from our Chromatography related questions to offer a small peak into our Product Testing Solutions formulations. You can find background information for the quiz questions here:

Pickering Test Solutions

Perspiration Tests of Consumer Products (White paper)

Product Testing Solutions Brochure

Quiz #42 – Product Testing Solutions

Natural human perspiration has a complex composition that depends on the type of sweat gland, the person’s metabolism and hydration level. Pickering Laboratories’ human mimic artificial perspiration solutions are formulated based on published data for human sweat and provide the closest match to the “real thing” available on the market. These solutions are perfect for testing a variety of consumer products and medical devices as well as for forensics applications and as blanks for medical testing protocols.

  • There are two types of human perspiration; _____________ and _____________ perspiration.
  • ____________ perspiration is used for body temperature regulation.
  • Eccrine perspiration contains _______ acids, minerals, and metabolites.
  • Pickering Laboratories’ proprietary Artificial Eccrine Perspiration comes at pH_____.
  • Apocrine perspiration is secreted by apocrine glands and contains _______ acids and proteins.
  • Apocrine perspiration is initially odorless. Odor (volatile fatty acids) is produced once acted upon by _____________.
  • What is an oily substance that mixes with lipids to form a protective coating on the skins surface?
    1. Sebum
    2. Cerumen
    3. Perspiration
    4. All of the above
  • Currently, Pickering Laboratories offers the following product testing solutions:
    1. Perspiration
    2. Blood
    3. Saliva
    4. Lung Fluid
    5. All of the above
  • The pH of the solution is an important consideration in product testing, affecting corrosion rate, level of color degradation and leaching of metals and organic components from wearable products. Many procedures require a tight pH range during testing. To accommodate these pH requirements and to improve pH stability over time, Pickering Laboratories is offering _________ versions of industry-specific artificial perspiration formulations. By adding a Phosphate buffer to the original formulation, the pH stability of the solution is greatly improved while its effect on corrosion and colorfastness remains unaffected.
  • _____________ is one of the most important concerns in the textile industry. Discoloration of fabric can be due to perspiration, light, rubbing or a combination of all three. Salt, urea and lactic acid present in sweat can disrupt the bonding that dyes form with the fabric fibers, causing fading of the color. In addition, amino acids in sweat can attach to fabric to produce “protein stains”.
    1. Dissolution
    2. Staining
    3. Corrosion
    4. Colorfastness
  • Use of nanotechnology to endow new properties to textiles, such as antibacterial or UV protection, water repellency or flame retardancy, together with incorporating sensors and other digital components, creates the need to consider the effects of sweat on nanoparticles leaching and _____________ of integrated circuits as well.
    1. Corrosion
    2. Rusting
    3. Colorfastness
    4. Dissolution
  • A Certificate of Analysis (COA) and Safety Data Sheet (SDS) are available for all product testing solutions at no additional charge. True or False
  • Pickering’s product testing solutions and mimics are convenient, save you time, homogenous, reproducible, and customizable. True or False
  • Pickering offers customizable versions of our product testing formulations. True or False
  • Pickering Labs will be at booth 2138 at Pittcon 2023. True or False

Submit your answers to rsmith@pickeringlabs.com by April 28, 2023.

Announcing the winners of our previous quiz, Chromatography Quiz #41 – Amino Acids Baseline Noise

What is causing the baseline issues illustrated in the amino acids chromatograms?

Answer: Outgassing. There was no 100psi back-pressure regulator installed on the outlet of the detector flow cell. Because of this, there was not enough pressure to prevent boiling in the heated reactor (130C), which led to small bubbles showing up in the baseline.

Pickering Laboratories would like to congratulate the winners for our previous newsletter’s Chromatography Quiz #41:

Josiah Hakala from Minnesota Department of Health and Narjes Ghafoori from Los Angeles County Public Health Laboratory. 

They each will soon be receiving an Ember Travel Mug!  This smart device is “the world’s first temperature control mug” and does more than simply keep your coffee hot. According to Ember, “our smart heated travel mug allows you to set an exact drinking temperature and keeps it there for up to 3 hours, so your coffee is never too hot, or too cold.” 

Seems pretty cool to us!

Congratulations to our quiz winners!  Thank you all for your submissions!

Paralytic Shellfish Toxins

By: Saji George

The paralytic shellfish toxins (PSTS) are a group of secondary metabolites (biotoxins) deposited in bivalve shellfish by dinoflagelates. Dinoflagelates blooms are seasonal, occurring during warm months. Since it is unpredictable whether an infestation will occur, the shellfish population should be regularly monitored for toxins. Ingestion of contaminated shellfish can lead to paralytic shellfish poisoning; a life-threatening illness.

Mouse bioassay (MBA) was the official method of AOAC International, but the drawbacks associated with this method have led to exploration of chemical methods. The most common HPLC post-column method is to oxidize the separated toxins under alkaline conditions to a fluorescent compound. Sullivan et al. used this method to determine the gonyautoxins 1-6 (GTX1-6), saxitoxin (STX) and neosaxitoxin (neoSTX) but not the N-sulfocarbamoyl-11-hydroxysulfate toxins (C1-C4). Oshima et al. modified this method to determine the 3 toxin groups separately using isocratic elution with 3 different mobile phases. An improved method using post-column oxidation (PCOX) followed by fluorescence detection was developed by Canadian Food inspection Agency (CFIA) in collaboration with National Research Council Canada (CNRC) has led to a shorter analysis time to determine the 3 groups of toxins using step gradient and a switching valve.

This method offers a high throughput alternative to live animal testing or lengthy instrumental methods currently acceptable for regulatory testing. All MBA analyses for PSTs were eliminated in CFIA laboratories when the PCOX method was granted Official Method of Analysis (OMA), First Action status in April, 2011, and the PCOX method was considered a quantitative, regulatory method, without the need for MBA confirmation of results. The PCOX method was promoted to AOAC OMA 2011.02, Final Action status in 2013.

For further reading/information here’s a very helpful link to a video from one of our customers, The Sitka Tribe of Alaska , which does a great job walking through the collection/testing process.  If you are interested, Pickering Labs has created our own PSP method utilizing our Post-Column instrumentation.

More 20th Anniversary Celebrations for our Staff!

By: Jim Murphy and Rebecca Smith (with contributions from Kevin and David)

Our parade of well-wishes for our long-time employees continues as we congratulate our friends Saji George and Sareeta Nerkar on their 20 years of service at Pickering Labs.  We can’t speak for the two of them, but on our side, Jim and I have loved every minute of our time with these two chemists!  

Since Saji and Sareeta began working here in 2002, they have each been a big part of Pickering’s many milestones, from the launching of our Vector (2005), Pinnacle (2006) and Onyx (2020) instruments all the way to the earliest advent of our PTS product line (2007).  We are so proud of both women and their many accomplishments, here at the lab and out in the greater scientific community. 

In addition to her daily contributions as our brilliantly organized QA Manager, Saji has also been a driving force behind our emergence as a trusted partner in the AATCC textile-testing world, serving as our main ambassador and lending her technical expertise to that organization’s members.  She has also taken on this role at the WEAR Conference, supporting both smart textiles as well as wearable electronics manufacturers.  On the Post-Column side of our business, she has been part of the development of many analytical methods, most recently for Paralytic Shellfish Toxins and Formaldehyde analysis.

Saji’s 20th anniversary in October 2022.

Meanwhile, Sareeta has long been a member of our small but dynamic R&D team.  Her contributions as a Research Chemist (most recently in Cannabinoids, Nitrosamines and Mycotoxins applications) also extend beyond these walls, as Sareeta is an active member of the NACRW.  She has recently expanded her NACRW role to include conference Social Chair in addition to representing Pickering while in attendance.  Sareeta is also a repeat presenter at the Emerald Conference and this year, she’ll be showcasing a poster at the Cannabis Science Conference. 

Sareeta at her September 2022 celebration, with Jim and Rebecca alongside.

A long-time resident of the Bay Area, Saji raised her two boys (Isaac and Thomas) with her husband George in Palo Alto and while living there became great friends with Judy Pickering, the wife of our late founder Michael Pickering.  Since her two boys have “flown the coop”, Saji and George have relocated back to her beloved Monterey Peninsula and, yes, she does make the drive up to our office in Mountain View daily (she’s very fond of audiobooks!).  Saji’s favorite things include tennis and gardening and she’ll gladly tell you about her trip to Wimbledon, just ask!

Saji and husband George at a holiday party with Judy Pickering.

Sareeta and her husband Nitin have also raised two children into adulthood.  Over the years, her daughters Pooja and Revati have attended several Pickering luncheons.  And Pooja even recently accompanied Sareeta to Rebecca’s wedding!  Talk about family. 😊 When she’s not here at work, Sareeta enjoys the chemistry of cooking.  Finding joy in the overlaps between laboratory and kitchen is a hobby she shared with Michael Pickering, as you might recall from newsletter articles in the past.  Sareeta has shared her love of cooking with her daughters and husband, but these days she also shares a little taste here and there with her dog, Leo!

Sareeta and daughter Pooja, in St. Helena with Rebecca and Paul.

Jim and I appreciate both of these awesome chemists so much and we cannot thank them enough for their contributions during 20 years here at Pickering.  Congratulations again to Sareeta and Saji!  Cheers!

 

 

 

 

Dow High Space Farmers

By: Kevin McKeown

At Pickering Labs we have always been very interested in the applications of our customers.  Our Artificial Body Fluids solutions have been used in cutting-edge COVID research, during early-stage development of some of the coolest tech gadgets, ensuring proper functionality of medical implants and many, many more novel purposes.  We wanted to highlight another use that we found particularly compelling.

Recently we were contacted by Margaret E. Hitt from Herbert Henry Dow High School in Midland, Michigan with a request for our Artificial Eccrine Perspiration.  Margaret is working on a cortisol biosensor to objectively test stress for astronauts on the International Space Station (ISS) and was in need of a sweat solution that closely mimicked actual human sweat, a very neat application!  This led us to look further into, and learn about, a wonderful program that is forward-looking and just plain cool: Dow High Space Farmers

Here’s a description of the program, and the scientific team, from their website:

 “An energetic group of Michigan students from Midland’s Dow High School, who are also Space Botany Researchers and growing future scientists in STEM.   We are part of NASA-sponsored programs, “Growing Beyond Earth” and “NASA HUNCH” (High School Students United with NASA to Create Hardware).

We stay in close touch with NASA scientists, conducting space botany research based on the rigorous procedures, while also keeping touch with our creative and critical-thinking side through student-proposed original research and experimentation.  We present our research to NASA scientists and administrators in the GBE Research Sympoisum, International Space Station Research & Development Conference, and Michigan Space Grant Consortium Conference. 

As someone who has long-struggled to keep my tomato and cucumber plants alive, this is just mind-blowing to me that the Dow High Space Farmers are researching ways to grow in space!  I mistakenly thought that Matt Damon’s farming scene from “The Martian” was pure science-fiction, but it seems like the youth of H.H. Dow High School are turning this into a reality.  Please visit their site if you’d like to learn more about this fascinating program.

Pittcon Announcement

By: Kevin McKeown

After what seems like a decade, but in reality is only 3 years, Pickering Labs is happy to FINALLY be back at exhibiting at Pittcon!  This year’s show will be in Philadelphia from March 20th to March 22nd.

We will be at Booth 2138 and in attendance will be Rebecca Smith, David Mazawa and Kevin McKeown.  If you, or anyone from your company, plan on attending we encourage you to stop by and say hello.  We will have daily giveaways and prizes include Apple Airpods and an Amazon Kindle Paperwhite!  Also displayed at our booth will be one of our Onyx instruments, some samples of our Artificial Body Fluid (PTS) solutions and a myriad of other literature for you to peruse.

We look forward to seeing all of our customers, international dealers and old friends that we’ve only been able to converse with over video conference for the past few years.  We wish everyone who’s attending safe travels and cannot wait to see you there!

Guaranteed Chemistry