Product category:
Microbiology
News Release from: Alaska Food Diagnostics | Subject: fastrAK rapid pathogen testing system
Edited by the Laboratorytalk Editorial
Team on 14 August 2007
Alaska release new food pathogen testing
system
Alaska Food Diagnostics' new fastrAK rapid pathogen testing system follows the first technology capitalisation from the UK Government's Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl) at Porton Down
Spinning out of Dstl and sharing the same Adenylate Kinase (AK) core technology, Alaska's team of world-class scientists has exploited patented AK Phage technology to develop a highly sensitive and specific series of rapid assays addressing food safety and product quality issues Having built an experienced management, development and technical team, Alaska has the extensive knowledge required to bring AK technology to the food and beverage market
This article was originally published on Laboratorytalk on 9 May 2007 at 8.00am (UK)
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Fast salmonella test for rapid pathogen detection
Alaska Food Diagnostics has launched Fastrak Salmonella, a groundbreaking ultra-rapid testing system for food manufacturers that provides results in 18 hours from sample receipt
Detect salmonella in just 18 hours
The 100-fold amplification process of Alaska's novel Fastrak technology is key to the high degree of sensitivity of the assay and the fastest time to result (TTR) of 18 hours
Combining novel technology with established culture and immunomagnetic methods, fastrAK signifies a major step forward in the rapid detection of food pathogens, through its dramatic improvement in test accuracy and speed.
In independent studies examining Salmonella spp.
in food samples, it produced higher numbers of positive results within a working day, compared with three days for a confirmed negative result and five days for a confirmed positive result using conventional culture methods.
The system uses immunomagnetic separation to isolate the food pathogen of interest such as Salmonella coupled with bacteriophage lysis to release intracellular AK from the target cells in a highly specific manner.
The AK released mediates the conversion of ADP to ATP and is measured as visible light produced by the bioluminescent reaction of the recombinant firefly enzyme luciferase, using the fastrAK luminometer.
The methodology is simple to employ in the laboratory and has a total 'hands on' time of less than 15 minutes.
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