Waters introduces LiveID software for real-time food analysis

Waters has introduced LiveID™ Software for near-instantaneous, direct-from-sample measurement and classification of food products including meat and crops by Waters’ quadrupole, time-of-flight (QTof) mass spectrometers. The new software enables mass spectrometers equipped with an iKnife™ sampling device, rapid evaporative ionisation mass spectrometry (REIMS) ion source and MassLynx® mass spectrometry software to help laboratories detect food fraud. In recent years, QTof mass spectrometry has emerged as a promising technique for detecting food fraud. Faster than conventional techniques like immunosassay and PCR, mass spectrometry with LiveID Software produces definitive results in seconds. With iKnife Sampling and REIMS, no sample pretreatment or separation is typically necessary. When the hand-held iKnife sampling device comes in contact with a sample of animal or plant tissue or other processed foodstuffs such as butter, it creates smoke containing compound-specific molecules which are directed to the REIMS source where the molecules are ionised and then passed on to be detected by the mass spectrometer. The LiveID software then creates a molecular profile or chemical fingerprint of the sample, compares it to a user-generated database of reference fingerprints and then classifies the sample as belonging to one of a number of sample types or groupings.