US Food and Drug Administration Selects Mass Spectrometry Instrumentation

Applied Biosystems, Inc has announced that the US Food and Drug administration has purchased seven of the company`s 4000 QTRAP® Systems for the analysis of potential harmful pesticides in the US food supply. Applied Biosystems will provide training of on-site FDA staff and will work with the technical personnel to validate methods that will be used to monitor pesticide residues at the seven laboratories.

The 4000 QTRAP system is a specialised mass spectrometer that integrates quantitative and qualitative analysis by combining triple quadrupole and linear ion trap capabilities on the same platform. It is the only system of its kind that provides information to identify and quantify contaminants at trace levels.

The FDA`s criteria for selecting the system required an integrated high performance benchtop hybrid triple quadrupole/linear ion trap LC/MS/MS (liquid chromatography/tandem mass spectrometry) system, as well as software that performs automated identification of contaminants.

Applied Biosystems met the criteria with the 4000 QTRAP System as part of an integrated solution, which also features Cliquidâ„¢ Software for Food Testing, an automated software application designed to identify a wide range of contaminants in food.