New Developments in Laboratory Technology and Instrumentation

Thejaswi Taylor, laboratory manager for SOCOTEC's Environmental Chemistry laboratory, is passionate about using innovative equipment to provide the best service for our clients. Here, she tells us about her experience at last week’s Lab Innovations exhibition, which was a great platform to see all the latest ideas in laboratory equipment and techniques under one roof. 

There’s a first time for everything

While I am always on the lookout for the latest and greatest laboratory advances, this was actually my first trip to Lab Innovations, the UK’s only event dedicated to laboratory professionals, and I’m pleased to say that it did not disappoint. I attended with my colleagues, Andrew Daley, team leader, Environmental Chemistry and Stacey Ottewill, deputy laboratory manager, Environmental Chemistry, so that we could assess potential opportunities for our Environmental Chemistry Laboratory as a team. Our objective for the day was to find a couple of new ideas to take back to the laboratory, but we were overwhelmed by the sheer scale of information and opportunity the moment that we arrived – it was huge!

Innovative opportunity

Every minute of the event was packed full of opportunity for us to look at even more new developments in technology and instrumentation for our Environmental Chemistry laboratory. We are constantly at the forefront of streamlining methods and processes, from titrations and Gravimetric analysis, to Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), so we were excited to attend an event that played host to a number of key suppliers of laboratory equipment.

In addition to attending informative seminars, which furthered my knowledge on the latest in environmental chemistry thinking, methodologies and equipment, we visited a number of exhibitors’ stands, where we got to see the most current ideas in action.

The social network

The great thing about events such as Lab Innovations is the opportunity to network. We were lucky enough to meet with a number of ESG suppliers at the event, including VWR, who we purchase a lot of our consumables from, such as beakers, volumetric flasks and tubing. We also got to meet with Analytix, after attending one of their seminars, who were promoting their new Thermal Desorption: CDS 7500s autosampler. Our team has an innovative outlook, so it is always interesting to hear about new developments that our suppliers have achieved and it was great to be able to see some of them in action.

Because the event was at the NEC the scale was massive and there was a bigger range of suppliers than we had ever seen in one place. One of the areas that we are looking into is GCxGC. For those who haven’t previously heard of this, the equipment uses a pair of gas chromatography columns, which are connected. The result, over and above a standard gas chromatographer, is a four-dimensional chromatogram, which allows the fractionation of Total Petroleum Hydrocarbons. With this in mind, we went to visit JSB, the largest regional reseller for agilent technologies.

JSB’s stand was amazing, with a robot barman, built using a headspace autosampler, which we ordinarily use for volatile organic compound analysis, being put to good use by making and offering sample size cocktails to those visiting the stand. An extra little touch was that the robot was wearing a bow tie and, I must say, the cocktail was pretty tasty too! It was certainly an innovative way to make gas chromatography even more interesting.

Valuable industry insight

I am privileged to be able to work with so many people who are genuinely passionate about Environmental Chemistry and it is great to have the opportunity to attend events, such as Lab Innovations, as they allow for us to network, gain valuable industry knowledge and continue to evaluate new ideas that can help improve our client service delivery.

I definitely left the exhibition saying, “wow there is a lot of new stuff coming out and we have made some great contacts with key people in instrumentation.” I am now happy to be back in the environmental chemistry laboratory, looking to see whether any of the new technology being showcased can be introduced into our processes. Who knows, in a couple of months’ time, I might be blogging about our latest innovation. Watch this space…

Did you attend this year’s Lab Innovations? What is the most innovative initiative that you saw and do you think that it can change laboratory practices for the future?