The Hitchhiker's guide to quality assurance

A report is given on a 2-day symposium “The Hitchhikers Guide to Quality Assurance” held in Brisbane Australia, in 2005. More than 100 representatives of field laboratories attended this educational exercise organised by the Royal Australian Chemical Institute.     

Micromachined Enzyme Reactor for FIA System

An enzyme reactor consisting of a 2.6-m-long silicon capillary with glucose oxidase immobilized on the inner surface was fabricated using micromachining techniques. A V-shaped groove of 100 μm width, formed by anisotropic etching, was anodically bonded to a glass plate to create the capillary. Glucose oxidase was covalently immobilized with 3-aminopropyltriethoxysilane and glutaraldehyde. The reactor was evaluated by connecting it to a Flow injection analysis system for glucose detection. Glucose concentrations were in the range of 10⁻³ to 5 × 10⁻²M with a volume of 0.2 μl of glucose solution.     

Micromachined detectors for an enzyme-based FIA

Micromachining techniques were applied to construct biosensor systems. The micromachined biosensors have small size, low production cost, and good reproducibility. We made some detection units for flow injection analysis (FIA). An electrochemical flow cell was fabricated, and both the enzyme immobilized column and electrochemical detector were integrated onto the same chip. A chemiluminescence detector was also fabricated and applied to the determination of glucose and lactic acid contained in human serum and urine.     

Application of factorial design to improve a FIA system for penicillin determination

A potentiometric FIA system for penicillin determination, employing penicillinase [E.C. 3.5.2.6] immobilized on silica gel, packed into a reactor, was improved by the use of statistically designed experiments. A two-level and three-factor factorial was used to find the best working conditions evaluating the influence of some parameters on the signal response of the system and the number of determinations per hour. These parameters were analyzed individually obtaining two level of the variables to be used in the factorial design: length of the reactor (1.5 and 2.0 cm), carrier flow rate (1.6 and 2.2 ml min⁻¹) and sample volume (100 and 150 μl). The pure error on the measurements was estimated by authentic repetitions. The ideal working conditions taking into account a compromise between the best response signal and the number of determinations per hour (with the same importance) being chosen the level of factors: length of reactor 1.5 cm, carrier flow rate 2.2 ml min⁻¹ and sample volume of 150 μl. Under these conditions the system allowed to analyze was about 45 samples per hour, during 73 days, with a standard deviation of 2.4% at concentration range between 10⁻¹ and 10⁻³ mol l⁻¹.     

高浓度试液流动注射在线稀释方法的研究

将分散－区域采样法用于高浓度试液的流动注射在线稀释，并考察了分散管的长度、管径、两次进样的时间间隔等因素对分散度的影响。方法的精密度优于区域采样法，相对标准偏差小于３％。     

Nafion-PAN optical chemical sensor: optimization by FIA

A copper-sensitive optical chemical sensor (optrode) is described. The optrode is based on a Nafion membrane and an immobilized organic ligand coupled with a flow injection (FI) system. The FI system includes a flow-through removable measuring cell and a simple spectrophotometer. Owing to the miniature size of the system and the efficient use of optical fibers, this optrode is well suited for monitoring environmental water samples. The success of the described optrode system depends on the effectiveness of the FI reagent delivery system. Optimum contact time with the membrane (as determined by the reagent flow rates) and the injected sample volume are critical. Environmental water samples were analyzed for copper content using the optimized optrode system. To validate the optrode's performance, the same water samples were analyzed using the atomic absorption spectrophotometer.     

Studies on peak width measurement-based FIA acid-base determinations

Summary Studies on Peak Width Measurement-Based FIA Acid-Base Determinations Peak width measurement is employed to determine strong acid or base concentrations by injection into an aqueous indicator flowstream. Investigated parameters include concentration and pK of the indicator, dimensions and nature of the dispersion tube, signal level employed for peak width measurement, sample volume, carrier flow rate, viscosity of the carrier stream and the diffusion coefficient of the analyte.     

FIA is already a routine tool in Brazil

The ability of FIA to handle large numbers of routine assays has been amply demonstrated in a laboratory in Brazil, where it is now used for 30% of the samples analysed.     

A hitchhiker's guide to poset ranking

When ranking objects (like chemicals, geographical sites, river sections, etc.) by multicriteria analysis, it is in most cases controversial and difficult to find a common scale among the criteria of concern. Therefore, ideally, one should not resort to such artificial additional constraints. The theory of partially ordered sets (or posets for short) provides a solid formal framework for the ranking of objects without assigning a common scale and/or weights to the criteria, and therefore constitutes a valuable alternative to traditional approaches. In this paper, we aim to give a comprehensive literature review on the topic. First we formalize the problem of ranking objects according to some predefined criteria. In this theoretical framework, we focus on several algorithms and illustrate them on a toy example. To conclude, a more realistic real-world application shows the power of some of the algorithms considered in this paper.     

A hitchhiker's guide to G-quadruplex ligands

Over the past decade, nucleic acid chemists have seen the spectacular emergence of molecules designed to interact efficiently and selectively with a peculiar DNA structure named G-quadruplex. Initially derived from classical DNA intercalators, these G-quadruplex ligands progressively became the focal point of new excitement since they appear to inhibit selectively the growth of cancer cells thereby opening interesting perspectives towards the development of novel anti-cancer drugs. The present article aims to help researchers enter this exciting research field, and to highlight recent advances in the design of G-quadruplex ligands.     

A practical guide to nano-LC troubleshooting

Capillary LC is one of the most powerful analytical tools available for separation scientists. Its unique analytical properties are associated with numerous technical issues that may cause operation of such systems to be somehow troublesome. Because of that, a good experience in capillary LC troubleshooting is required to keep the system in shape and, in effect, to obtain reliable results. In this paper, we summarize the most important issues of the capillary systems, including void and dead volumes, leakages, sample injection, and a multidimensional LC approach. The aim of this paper was to provide practical advise on system diagnosis, and to present solutions to problems discussed. Also, several exemplary nano-LC separations are included to demonstrate some typical problems encountered in our daily work.     

Inexpensive FIA method to determine trace levels of imazapyr by UV-detection enhanced with electrochemical polarization

A new flow injection analysis method with spectro-electrochemical detection (FIA/SEC) to determine trace levels of imazapyr on water samples is presented. The non-chromatographic method involves the use of a bench photometer, a single-potential potentiostat, a low pressure pumping system and a home-made spectro-electrochemical flow detector (SEC-FD), specifically adapted for the described method and using a stainless steel/electrolytic lead/lead chloride (SS/e-Pb/PbCl₂) working electrode. The limit of quantification (LOQ) reached for the optimized work parameters was 0.02 µg/mL, the relative standard deviation (RSD) in the whole range of linear response was less than 2% and a wide linear response range from 0.005 to 6.0 µg/mL was obtained. A standard addition method was used to determine the imazapyr amount in natural waters containing commercial formulation of such herbicide, the Recovery % has values close to 105%. The method performance makes it suitable to analyze the legal imazapyr tolerances established by the U.S. EPA avoiding the use of expensive chromatographic equipments and/or complicated sample preparations.     

Spectrophotometric FIA methods for determination of hydrogen peroxide: Application to evaluation of scavenging capacity

The determination of hydrogen peroxide (H₂O₂) and the evaluation of scavenging capacity against this species were performed using five colorimetric reactions, which were adapted to flow injection analysis. The reactions chosen were based on the oxidation of iodide (I⁻ method), on the formation of titanium-peroxide complex (TiP method), on the formation of titanium-xylenol orange-peroxide complex (TiXoP method), on the oxidation of 3,3′,5,5′-tetramethylbenzidine (TMB method) and on the co-oxidation of phenol-4-sulfonic acid and 4-aminoantipyrine (PSA/4-AAP method). The operational conditions were studied in order to improve the sensitivity of each method. Concerning to the method sensitivity, the ranking order was TMB method > I⁻ method > TiXoP method ∼PSA/4-AAP method > TiP method. All methods showed an excellent repeatability (RSD < 2%) and, except for I⁻ method, relative deviations from the reference method were <1.9%. The FIA manifolds were adapted to perform the determination of scavenging capacity against H₂O₂ and glutathione (GSH) was applied as model compound. TiP and TiXoP methods were not suitable as no inhibition or an increase of analytical signal was attained. PSA/4-AAP method was chosen for further application to dietary phenolics and pharmaceutical compounds, providing IC₅₀ values for those compounds that are fast reacting antioxidants.     

Lead determination at the ppb level using stopped-flow FIA

A flow-injection-based kinetic method for the determination of lead ions was developed. In this method, resazurin was reduced to resorufin by sulfide and lead ions. The method has a detection limit of 1 ppb with a relative standard deviation of 5.2% at the 20 ppb level. Interferences can be removed by prior extraction.     

流动注射分光光度法测定碘酸钾碘盐中碘

基于碘酸根离子在弱酸性条件下能与碘化钾-淀粉溶液生成蓝色络合物的原理提出了一种流动注射分光光度法测定碘酸钾碘盐中碘含量的方法.方法线性范围广(0～1.4μg·ml~(-1)),适用于加碘盐50倍稀释液的测定,检出限为0.03μg·ml~(-1)(对应于加碘盐1.5μg·g~(-1)).对于测定0.2,0.6和1.0μg·ml~(-1)浓度的相对标准偏差分别为1.85%,1.14%和0.34%(n=5),分析频率为120样品·h~(-1),特别适用于大批量样品的测定.     

Using bonding to guide transition state optimization

Optimization of a transition state typically requires both a good initial guess of the molecular structure and one or more computationally demanding Hessian calculations to converge reliably. Often, the transition state being optimized corresponds to the barrier in a chemical reaction where bonds are being broken and formed. Utilizing the geometries and bonding information for reactants and products, an algorithm is outlined to reliably interpolate an initial guess for the transition state geometry. Additionally, the change in bonding is also used to increase the reliability of transition state optimizations that utilize approximate and updated Hessian information. These methods are described and compared against standard transition state optimization methods. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.