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Develop and validate very fast, automated, and sensitive, multiresidue methods of analysis for pesticides in nonfatty and fatty foods. The ultimate goal is to be able to screen, quantify, and confirm the indentification of a diverse range of pesticide residues between parts-per-billion (ppb) concentrations within 15 minutes. Extensive evaluation and validation studies will be conducted to facilitate implementation of the methods by regulatory agencies and industry.
Each collaborator will use a different technical approach to determine the wide range of pesticides. In Israel,Prof. Amirav will develop and work to commercialize instrumentation based on supersonic beam mass spectrometry. This approach can be used for a fast screening of thermally labile pseticides that cannot be determined by traditional gas chromatographic techniques. The ARS investigator will utilize direct sample introduction (DSI) in gas chromatography (GC) followed by pulsed flame photometric detection (PFPD) and/or tandem mass spectrometry (MS-MS). The approach is capable of analyzing more than 100 targeted pesticides at ultratrace concentrations. The use of DSI helps to eliminate or minimize pre-analysis cleanup steps and permits large volume injection of dirty extracts while still maintaining a rugged system. MS-MS detection is a universally selective, sensitive, and confirmatory detector for complex matrices, and PFPD is capable of detecting any organophosphorus pesticides above 0.1 ppb.