Whisky Identification Goes CSI

[pepcycle]

Want to know who produced a whiskey?

Check this out!!

Its a little techy but the idea is that distilleries have a distinctive "fingerprint" and you can compare an unkown whisky to a library to ID fakes or as might be more useful, identify the provenance of bulk whiskey cat and dog labels.

http://www.bdal.com/uploads/media/Bruker_Metabolomics2010_P8B_023.pdf

[squire]

Ed I clicked on the page and quickly found myself in too deep water. Guess I'll just have to rely on the old fashioned method of swallowing the stuff.

[CorvallisCracker]

Want to know who produced a whiskey?

Check this out!!

Its a little techy but the idea is that distilleries have a distinctive "fingerprint" and you can compare an unkown whisky to a library to ID fakes or as might be more useful, identify the provenance of bulk whiskey cat and dog labels.

http://www.bdal.com/uploads/media/Bruker_Metabolomics2010_P8B_023.pdf

Cool!

I'll be looking for a second hand mass spectrometer at the next OSU surplus property sale!

[fishnbowljoe]

Cool!

I'll be looking for a second hand mass spectrometer at the next OSU surplus property sale!

Oh no. Here we go again. :skep: Joe

[cowdery]

Make it a smart phone app and I'm in.

[craigthom]

Isn't using lab equipment how Ted Breaux reverse-engineered absinthe, to make sure he was making it right? And to prove it didn't have enough wormwood to be dangerous?

[cowdery]

Isn't using lab equipment how Ted Breaux reverse-engineered absinthe, to make sure he was making it right? And to prove it didn't have enough wormwood to be dangerous?

That's how I understand it.

I also know the producers are using this or some similar technology because I know they can analyze a whiskey and determine who made it. I know this because I have had producers say to me, "we analyzed X and determined it was made by Y."

[pepcycle]

Our lab is buying this technology for a completely different reason.

The old method of growing bacteria to identify them takes days. This technology does the same thing in minutes.

I'm sure I could modify the applications for alternate use. Might open up a new avenue for business.

But what would I call this combo?

Bugs and Jugs?

UTI's and BTS (Beverage Testing Services)?

[B.B. Babington]

Though simply saying ethanol is present and what proof is all they're really concerned with, BTAF and others have done this stuff for ages. The biggest application for the fancier stuff is simply to ID taxed vs untaxed based on profile. That's a little dicier with the proliferation of "white lightning" type products on the shelves now.

LC/MS is the best way to go for a lab serious about this type of analysis.

I think APCI may work better than electrospray (as in the article), but LC/MS people are hooked on electrospray these days because that's the way instruments get QA'd during factory site installation and some folks are too afraid to explore beyond that.