Thermo Fisher Scientific has announced the availability of a method to detect melamine and cyanuric acid in food matrices.
The method uses Thermo Scientific instrumentation for liquid chromatography coupled with tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) systems and is published in the US Food and Drug Administration's Laboratory Information Bulletin Number 4396, May 2007.
The LC-MS/MS method utilises the Thermo Scientific TSQ Quantum triple quadrupole mass spectrometer coupled to a Thermo Scientific Surveyor MS pump and autosampler.
Thermo Scientific Xcalibur data system software was used to acquire and analyse the data.
Thermo Fisher Scientific has also published a related application note (Thermo Scientific Application Note 424 - May 2008), entitled 'Analysis of Melamine and Cyanuric Acid in Food Matrices by LC-MS/MS'.
This application was developed on the TSQ Quantum Ultra in collaboration with the National Center for Food Safety and Technology at the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago, Illinois.
This method is being used as a reference by the labs under Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (AQSIQ) in China to develop an LC-MS/MS method using TSQ Quantum systems for the detection of melamine in milk and infant formula.
The Thermo Scientific TSQ Quantum triple quadrupole system enables highly-selective reaction monitoring (H-SRM), which facilitates the efficient analysis of complex samples such as food matrices and animal tissue.
Additionally, the Thermo Scientific solution, when coupled to Turboflow technology, has the advantage of providing a total solution from online sample preparation to data analysis.
