Kathryn Lee

The December meeting of the New York–New Jersey chapter of the Society for Applied Spectroscopy (NYSAS), held at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York (“The Met”), drew an audience of students and professionals to hear talks on material testing by Eric Breitung, PhD, a senior research scientist, and Catherine Stephens, PhD, an associate research scientist, both from The Met.

The October meeting of the New York–New Jersey chapter of the Society for Applied Spectroscopy (NYSAS) drew a large crowd to hear a talk on three-dimensional (3D) printing and chemical imaging by Emil Ciurczak, a consultant on laboratory and process applications of near-infrared (NIR) spectroscopy.

At the September 27, 2017, meeting of the New York–New Jersey chapter of the Society for Applied Spectroscopy, Gene Hall, a professor of analytical chemistry at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey, shared some of his recent work using Raman spectroscopy, mid-infrared (IR) spectroscopy, and gas chromatography–time-of-flight mass spectrometry (GC–TOF-MS) to analyze omega-3 fatty acid supplements marketed for pets.

Raman spectroscopy is particularly useful for identification of contaminant materials in pharmaceuticals because it can very clearly and nondestructively identify materials. Raman spectroscopy can be used to identify foreign matter on tablets as well as the individual tablet materials to confirm the material’s legitimacy. For injectable drug vials, Raman spectroscopy can be used with microscopy to count, size, and identify particulate contamination found in such vials. Spectral interpretation is key to the value of Raman spectroscopy, and it is important for accuracy of identification not to simply rely on library match values.