JPP is a UK-based R&D company which, since its formation in 2005, has focused exclusively on simplifying and improving the methods used to carry out traditional AAA. These methods are all based on chemistry principles first discovered in 1948 by Moore & Stein, two Nobel Prize-winning US bio-chemists.
The nightmare called hydrindantin
Under the ‘Moore & Stein method’ hydrindantin is a fundamental constituent of the ninhydrin reagents used in analysis.
Difficulties have always existed in handling this organic chemical because it has a very short life in the presence of air. To try to overcome this, reagents used in analysis have been supplied in two bottles (or their equivalent) for mixing in the laboratory immediately before use. Despite the practical and other difficulties this has caused both suppliers and users, ‘Moore & Stein’ has always been regarded as the “gold standard” in the industry, with no viable alternative having emerged since the method was universally adopted in the 1950s.
JPP’s solution
JPP has discovered and patented different and much simpler methods to carry out analysis, all using single-bottle, hydrindantin-free, air-stable reagents. Nothing else is added at any stage of the analytical process. Sensitivity and analytical performance levels achieved using these new methods are consistently higher than those achieved using conventional two-bottle reagents (or their equivalent) on single heating chamber analysers in common use today.
One bottle – no fuss
JPP has ‘altered the chemistry’ so that hydrindantin is produced during the analytical process itself. Under JPP’s methods there is thus no need for hydrindantin to be included in the ninhydrin reagents used in analysis or added by different means before analysis can take place. A ‘ready to use’ reagent in a single bottle is all that is required.