Department of Chemistry

Your Name
Friend's Email Address
Comments
 
 

March 16, 2006

Purdue chemical-analysis method promises fast results

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — Researchers at Purdue University have shown how a new ultra-fast chemical-analysis tool has numerous promising uses for detecting everything from cancer in the liver to explosives residues on luggage and "biomarkers" in urine that provide an early warning for diseases.

Christopher Mulligan
uses Purdue's Mini 10
Download photo
caption below
The analytical chemists have most recently demonstrated how the technology, called desorption electrospray ionization, or DESI, rapidly detects the boundaries of cancerous tumors, information that could help ensure that surgeons remove the entire tumor.

"I wouldn't be surprised if pathologists are using this in operating rooms within two years," said R. Graham Cooks, the Henry Bohn Hass Distinguished Professor of Analytical Chemistry in Purdue's College of Science.

The technology has made it possible to speed up and simplify the use of a mass spectrometer, an analytical device that in its conventional form has been long established in modern laboratories. But while ordinary mass spectrometry is both time- and labor-intensive, the Purdue group has modified the technology to make it faster, more versatile and more portable.

Mini 10 portable mass spectrometer
Download photo
caption below
"The theme in our lab is 'Don't mess with chemicals,' meaning we don't undertake the usual chemical separations and manipulations needed for conventional mass spectrometry," said Cooks, who has developed a wandlike probe that can quickly gather chemical information from samples in the environment.

A review paper about DESI and related techniques, which enable the direct chemical analysis of objects in an ordinary environment, will appear in the Friday (March 17) issue of the journal Science. The paper was written by Cooks, associate research scientist Zheng Ouyang, visiting scholar Zoltán Takáts and doctoral student Justin Wiseman, all in Purdue's Department of Chemistry.

Paul Shepson, Head
Feedback | E-mail Webmaster

Purdue University, 560 Oval Drive, West Lafayette, IN 47907
(765) 494-5200
© 2010 Purdue University | An equal access/equal opportunity university | Copyright Complaints
If you have trouble accessing this page because of a disability, please contact the Webmaster at webmaster@chem.purdue.edu.