Improving turnaround time and productivity in total fat determination


Eurofins scientific Nantes France

CUSTOMER

Eurofins Scientific is the recognized leader in food and pharmaceutical product testing.
Eurofins offers high quality assurance and control services such as testing, certification, inspection, audits, technical services and regulations for manufacturers, brand owners, distributors and retailers throughout the world.
Since throughput and fast delivery of results is a key point for the Eurofins group, they have already in use a Milestone ultraWAVE digestion system for sample preparation for trace metal analysis.

CHALLENGE

Eurofins needed to determine the total fat content in over 200 samples per day on several food matrices such as meat, sausage, cheese, cookies etc. Prior to the implementation of the ETHOS X method, they were using two different techniques:
  1. Firstly, a sequential approach technique based on hydrolysis followed by solvent extraction that employs an “inverted gravimetric method” where fat content is determined by weight loss of the sample instead of by weight of the extract as normally calculated.The process took approximately 3 days to complete.

  2. Secondly, traditional Soxhlet approach was used for samples with low fat content. This approach was time consuming and required a large volume of solvent thus exposing laboratory technicians to possible health risk.
From the customer voice:
“The first reason we chose ETHOS X was that we need to have faster results. Sequential technology required us 3 days for delivery of the results. Moreover, with that technology, we are not able to provide reproducible results on samples with very low fat content since the sample amount was limited”
– Mr. Guerin, Production Unit Manager, Eurofins Nantes Lab
  • Eurofins scientific Nantes France
  • Eurofins scientific Nantes France
  • Eurofins scientific Nantes France

IMPLEMENTATION of ETHOS X microwave extraction system

Milestone product specialists presented the ETHOS X for total fat determination to Eurofins lab in Nantes (France) and Mr. Regis Guerin, Production Unit Manager Nutritional Labelling, saw the potential of this new approach, so they invested in one system. After a couple of months of testing and method optimization on several CRM materials, they purchased four more instruments. Today they have installed five (5) ETHOS X units with ten (10) rotors to perform total fat determination on a wide suite of food samples. Eurofins recognized in the ETHOS X a perfect solution for their needs since the new method boost their total fat determination to 300 samples in a single working day.
An additional benefit of the ETHOS X process is the ability to connect a balance to the instrument itself, so that its operating software automatically calculates the fat content and provides all the statistics associated to the analysis of the samples. This new method has allowed Eurofins to replace all the current methods of total fat determination and to standardize the use of a single method in on most of their samples.

ETHOS X for Fat Analysis in Food & Feed Samples

The ETHOS X offers a new approach to gravimetric fat determination, moving toward a more modern, greener and more efficient approach to total fat, Fatty Acid Methyl Ester (FAME) and free fat determinations in food and feed matrices.
ETHOS X

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"The advantages of ETHOS X compared to sequential technology are the lower initial investment, the universal method for all food samples and with no unit corrosion"
Eurofins Nantes Lab