James Hannan

Thermo Fisher Scientific

Biography:

Having studied at the University of Manchester, UK followed by 7 years performing ionic and trace elemental analysis at environmental laboratories, James joined Thermo Fisher Scientific as part of the ICP-OES product team based in Cambridge, UK. In 2014 he moved to the UK applications support team, providing user support, setup and training for Trace Elemental and Discrete Industrial Analyzers. As of 2019, James is Thermo Fisher Scientific’s European applications expert for Trace Elemental & Discrete Industrial Analysis instruments.

Short description about presentation:

Wastewater based epidemiology WBE programs can be an invaluable additional predictive tool for addressing the COVID19 pandemic. Virus quantification by RTqPCR, together with other biomarkers like phosphorus, total nitrogen and pH play an important role in sewage water analysis in WBE programs, and sewage water treatment. Creatinine and Urea in sewage water are used as endogenous population size markers. Analysis of chemical and physiochemical reference parameters such as pH and conductivity, ammonia, nitrate, nitrite, total organic nitrogen, orthophosphate, and other ions such as chloride and sulfate in sewage water are important for matrix recovery control also called a process control to understand the amount of virus lost during sample processing. Determination of these chemical reference parameters and population size markers by traditional methods are tedious, time consuming and error prone. Using the high throughput discrete analyzer platform enables laboratories to simplify the sewage water and wastewater surveillance for COVID19 testing with dual benefitstime and cost savings. All necessary analysis steps are automated. Parallel determination of multiple analytes from a single sample as well as the presence of several automated features ensures analytical efficiency as implemented in government laboratories in the United Kingdom.