On July 17 – 20th, GERSTEL exhibited at the 53rd annual North American Chemical Residue Workshop at St. Pete Beach, FL, at the Tradewinds Island Grand Resort. NACRW conducts an annual meeting for scientists particularly interested in trace level analysis of pesticides, veterinary drug residues, and other chemicals in food, animal feed, and environmental samples.
The purpose of the meeting is to provide training, develop and improve technical knowledge, facilitate development and distribution of new analysis methods and techniques, and establish networking to promote professional cooperation between scientists of these interests.
The show started off with a 2 day short course on Quantitative Analysis by Mass Spectrometry given by Robert Bethem and Mike Filigenzi of the California Animal Health and Food Safety Laboratory and University of California at Davis. The day ended with a cannabis testing seminar and a welcome reception.
The following three days provided a wealth of knowledge and information spanning from a synopsis of food commodities that have been analyzed for over 25 years, to the overview of cannabis regulation as it relates to pesticide testing. CLICK HERE to access the entire meeting program. You can also go to the NACRW LinkedIn group to review discussions and photos from this year’s event.
One of the major topics of discussion this year was the importance of automation for QueChers and Automatic Liner Exchange for dirty matrices. The GC-MS analysis of pesticides in dirty matrices is challenging because the non-volatile components collect in the inlet liner causing gradual deterioration of chromatographic performance such as tailing peak shapes and irreproducible response. To learn more about the automated QuEChERS extract clean-up for LC-MS/MS, click the box below to download a free PDF.
