Agilent Technologies announces new lab informatics suite at Pittcon 2010

Agilent Technologies Inc.Mar 2 2010

Agilent Technologies Inc. (NYSE:A) today announced the following at Pittcon 2010:

• a major new lab informatics suite;
• a fish species verification lab-on-a-chip system;
• a major food testing lab collaboration;
• a high-performance transportable GC/MSD;
• a high-throughput single quadrupole liquid chromatograph/mass spectrometer (LC/MS).

The company also announced a tool to facilitate third-party software control for Agilent LCs.

OpenLAB Unified Software Suite

Agilent’s major new lab informatics suite, the OpenLAB portfolio, is designed to enable customers to easily capture, analyze and share scientific data throughout the lab and across the enterprise. OpenLAB is scalable, open architecture based on industry open standards.

Agilent OpenLAB consists of three integrated solutions: OpenLAB Chromatography Data System (CDS), OpenLAB Electronic Lab Notebook (ELN), and OpenLAB Enterprise Content Manager (ECM).

The system is designed to grow with customers’ needs, from a small standalone analytical lab, through a global network with hundreds of locations. Agilent OpenLAB is instrument-vendor neutral and protects the customers’ investment by providing an easy migration path for their existing systems.

Agilent OpenLAB CDS is based on the popular ChemStation and EZChrom Elite instrument systems, which means customers don’t have to sacrifice familiar workflows to realize OpenLAB’s advantages.

Agilent OpenLAB ELN makes the efficiencies and security of electronic lab notebooks accessible to a wider range of labs, including those doing routine analytical work in fields such as hydrocarbon processing, environmental analysis, pharmaceutical food safety, and forensics.

Agilent OpenLAB ECM is a secure, central repository enabling customers to capture, manage, share, archive, and re-use any data in most file formats.

Agilent also introduced the Instrument Control Framework (ICF), a software component making it faster and easier for third-party software to control Agilent liquid chromatography (LC) systems in chromatographic data systems or workstations. Based on new standard instrument drivers from Agilent, ICF eliminates much of the delay and effort associated with software developers using low-level instrument control codes to write their own native drivers. ICF is available to software developers at no cost.

Fish Species Verification

The Agilent Fish Species Identification method speeds and simplifies the use of DNA to identify fish species in food products. The Agilent Fish Species Identification method makes this highly accurate technique feasible for routine verification of seafood labeling and detecting species substitutions.

The system uses an Agilent DNA Fish Species ID Ensemble with an Agilent 2100 Bioanalyzer lab-on-a-chip system, and specialized RFLP Decoder Software. The DNA analysis method is based on polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism (PCR-RFLP). The method is far more accurate and robust than existing protein-based tests, and also reduces the time needed to confirm species in food from days to hours.

Major Food Lab Collaboration

Agilent and the National Center for Food Safety and Technology (NCFST) today announced that they have entered into a collaboration to develop new scientific methods for food testing, with the goal of solving a wide range of persistent problems facing global food supply chains.

As part of the collaboration, Agilent will equip the NCFST lab in Summit-Argo, Ill., with an extensive assortment of the latest analytical chemistry and life science instrumentation including:

• a Model 7890 gas chromatograph;
• a Model 5975B gas chromatograph/mass spectrometer (GC/MS);
• a Model 7000B triple quadrupole GC/MS;
• a Model 1290 Infinity ultra high-performance liquid chromatograph (UHPLC);
• a Model 6400 triple quadrupole LC/MS;
• a Model 6500 Accurate Mass quadrupole time-of-flight MS;
• a Model 7700 inductively coupled-plasma MS; and
• a Model 2100 Bioanalyzer, which is a lab-on-a-chip system set up to analyze DNA in fish samples.

The NCFST is a unique research consortium among the United States Food and Drug Administration’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition (FDA CFSAN), Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) and the food industry.

High-Performance Transportable GC/MSD

Agilent also introduced the 5975T Low Thermal Mass (LTM) Gas Chromatography/Mass Spectrometry Detector (GC/MSD), the industry’s first commercial transportable GC/MS system that delivers laboratory-quality analysis. Using proprietary LTM technology, Agilent has developed the 5975T LTM GC/MS to be smaller, more rugged and to consume less power than in-lab GC/MSD instruments, yet capable of the same high-quality performance in the field.

The 5975T LTM GC/MSD is particularly well-suited for chemical warfare analysis, first responders, and military and homeland security officials who need fast and highly accurate results in the field. Additional out-of-laboratory applications include food safety testing and environmental monitoring.

Higher-Throughput Single Quad LC/MS

In addition, Agilent introduced the Agilent 6150B Series single quadrupole liquid chromatograph/mass spectrometer (LC/MS), a new generation of this workhorse instrument. The 6150B Series has substantially higher sample throughput and delivers unmatched performance in the single quad LC/MS category.

To match the speed of fast chromatography, including ultra high-performance liquid chromatography (UHPLC) such as the Agilent 1290 Infinity platform, the Agilent 6150B Series can scan at 10,000 amu per second, while maintaining exceptional data quality. This is important to confirm identification of the correct compound in the complex reaction mixtures, such as those found in drug discovery synthesis.