Category Archives: Swine Flu

More details on swine flu and testing with chromatography

Following yesterday’s post about swine flu testing with chromatography, there’s been numerous articles, posts, and papers offered up about the swine flu break out.swine flu vaccine

We’ve compiled some of these here, and invite you to keep us informed of anything you come across that may be of interest – simply submit your material below.

First, for all of the latest from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on the swine flu, click here.

For information about how Thin Layer Chromatography is used to detect counterfeit pharmaceuticals, including Tamiflu, click here.

For an article from TheScientist.com about biotech’s response to swine flu, click here.

For an article from the Wall Street Journal about the need for rapid tests, click here.

Chromatography used for testing Swine Flu

UPDATE: Article from TheScientist.com – Can biotech tackle swine flu? – click here to read

For decades, scientists have been using Thin Layer Chromatography, HPLC, gas, and other forms of chromatography to study swine influenza.

Scientists working on swine fluHere is just one example. In October of 1985, a team from the Department of Neurology at The Medical University of South Carolina published “Lipid content of swine influenza and other vaccines” – here’s a couple of excerpts:

ABSTRACT: An analysis of the lipids in swine influenza vaccines was performed, comparing six different lots of swine influenza, other influenza and noninfluenza vaccines.
Cholesterol content and phospholipid content varied greatly, but there were no major differences between the types of vaccines. Appreciable amounts of phosphatidylethanolamine were found in only one swine influenza vaccine. The major phospholipids of influenza vaccines were phosphatidylcholine, sphingomyelin and phosphatidic acid. A detectable amount of phosphatidylserine was not found in any swine influenza vaccine, but was present in two of three nonswine influenza vaccines. Only two of six swine influenza vaccines showed trace amounts of ganglioside. However, larger quantities of galactocerebroside were found in all
influenza vaccines examined, including swine influenza vaccines.

Neutral lipids were separated on silica gel thin layer chromatography (TLC) plates developed in light petroleum ether/diethyl ether (96:4, v/v) and visualized by exposure to iodine vapors.
Phospholipids were separated by two-dimensional TLC using high performance TLC (HPTLC) plates. After application, samples were chromatographed in C/M/concentrated ammonia (65:35:5, v/v/v) to the top of the plate plus an additional 10 min. HPTLC plates were air-dried and held in vacuo overnight over P205 to reactivate the silica gel. Chromatography in the second direction was performed in chloroform/acetone/methanol/acetic acid/water (5:2:1:1:0.5, v/v/v/v/v). After being air-dried, phospholipids were visualized by exposure to iodine vapors, matched to standards and marked. After sublimation of I2, marked areas were carefully scraped from the glass backing, charred and assayed for liberated phosphate by the method of Ames {27}. Prior to TLC, aliquots were withdrawn and assayed in the same manner for total phospholipid determination.

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