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On-demand Webinar: Toxic metals in baby foods and the challenge of elemental analysis
Presentation 1: Using triple quadrupole ICP-MS to improve the speed, sensitivity, and accuracy of the analysis of toxic and nutritional elements in baby foods
Food and food supplements supply the human body not only with energy, but also essential macro- and micronutrients for a long and healthy life. While several elements are essential nutritional building blocks, exposure to heavy metals, like arsenic, mercury, and lead, potentially present in food as contaminants may lead to serious negative effects on health. An especially vulnerable group susceptible to different illnesses and potential lifelong neurological damage through exposure to toxic heavy metals are infants and young children.
Within the European Union, foods for babies and young children are governed specifically by EU regulations 609/20131 and EC No 1881/20065, setting low limits of arsenic, lead, and cadmium in food products. Such regulations are, however, subjected to regular amendments and expected to become more stringent worldwide. In this presentation, we are going present a simple and fast analytical method based on the combination of triple quadrupole ICP-MS with oxygen as the only collision / reaction cell gas used for highly accurate and sensitive analysis of both nutritional and toxic elements in different types of baby foods.
Presentation 2: Extending the scope of ICP-MS to the analysis of elemental species and nanoparticles in food
In some cases, the quantification of the pure concentration in which an element is present is not enough to draw meaningful conclusions about potential risks or even hazards related to the consumption of food. Arsenic, but also other elements, can be present in different chemical forms, with highly variable toxicity and bioavailability. For an accurate determination, not only of the concentration in which an element is present, but also its chemical form (or chemical species) hyphenation of liquid chromatography to ICP-MS is a powerful tool.
In addition, potentially harmful species of a given element may not only be different chemical forms, but also nanoparticles formed naturally from the use of food additives. A key example here is titanium dioxide, which, although chemically inert, has proven to be a potential carcinogen when present as nanoparticles. ICP-MS is capable to distinguish between dissolved forms of an element or the presence of nanoparticles when operated in the so-called single particle ICP-MS mode.
This presentation will highlight how ICP-MS can determine potentially harmful species or forms of different elements by hyphenation or application of different modes of measurement.
Speakers
Dr. Sukanya Sengupta | Application Specialist | Thermo Fisher Scientific
Sukanya is a geochemist by training, and she focused on triple oxygen isotope studies in terrestrial samples during her PhD and Post-doc research in Göttingen, Germany. She joined Thermo Fisher Scientific in Bremen in 2020 as Application Specialist for ICP-OES and ICP-MS, where she assists customers with their daily measurement routines by developing new methods and applications that meet the requirements of analytical testing laboratories and research facilities.
Dr. Daniel Kutscher | Product Marketing Specialist | Thermo Fisher Scientific
Daniel earned a degree in Chemistry at the University of Mainz, Germany, in 2007. Following that, he joined the Analytical Spectrometry Group at the University of Oviedo, Spain, where he obtained his Ph.D. in 2011. Daniel joined Thermo Fisher Scientific in 2011 as a Product Specialist for ICP-MS focusing on hyphenated techniques, such as IC-ICP-MS, and finding solutions for the high-throughput analysis of challenging sample types. In 2018, he became a Product Marketing Specialist.
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