Analytik Jena UK has introduced the Photochem analyser, a system that it claims can rapidly and accurately measure water-soluble and lipid-soluble antioxidants
Measuring antioxidant levels plays an important role in a host of applications.
These include characterisation of food quality, control of food processing technologies, improvement of product shelf life and measurement of the antioxidative efficiency of food additives.
Photochem uses the principle of photochemiluminescence, combining fast photochemical radical generation with sensitive luminometric detection.
The device has measurement times of less than three minutes, and sampling, measurement and rinse cycles are all performed automatically.
Typical applications for Photochem include; water-soluble antioxidative capacity of lyophilised vegetables, fruit juice and beer; water- and lipid-soluble antioxidative capacity in bakers yeast, cheese, tea and coffee and lipid-soluble antioxidative capacity in edible oil and salami extracts.
According to the company, this technique has considerable benefits over the conventional ELISA measurement method, which generates synthetic free radicals.
Reaction between synthetic free radicals and antioxidants can be significantly different from 'real' free radicals.
