How to doctors/ lab techs weigh mineral content contained by a blood taste?
I am designing a lab for a biology class, and I need to know how a blood sample can be examined to observe mineral content level (specifically potassium).
What types of machines or techniques are used in this process?
Answers:
I actually do this everyday. I am a toxicologist and my specialty is elemental analysis.
There are several instruments that you use to analyze potassium. One is call an ICP-MS (Inductivley Coupled Plasma-Mass Spectrometer), annother is called an ICP-OES (Inductively Coupled Plasma-Optical Emmision Spectrometer), another is called a FAA (Flame Atomic Abosrption Spectrometer), and the other most common instrument is call a GFAA (Graphite Furnace Atomic Abosorbtion Spectrometer).
Personally for analyzing the K (Potassium) isotope alone, the most widely used instrument in medical labs is the ICP-MS, due to its accuracy. You take a fundamentally small (10-100 ul) sample of whole blood and dilute it with a prepared diluent mixture) after it is vortexed (mixed) and loaded on to the instrument's autosampler, and is then sampled and analyzed by the ICP-MS.
Is this somthing that you are actually trying to do contained by your class? Are you a student or a teacher? Is this college, High School? If you are just trying to do it in suggestion, then I can actually send you an SOP (standard operating procedure) for exactly how the process is done. But if this is somethin you are trying to truly carry out in the lab, then first of adjectives, OSHA (Occupational Health and Safety) usually does not allow students to handle biological specimens, and secondly, all of the instrumentation that is used to do this is VERY expensive. My ICP-MS alone cost around 150,000 dollars and the cheapest of them, the FAA, still costs around 40,000 dollars.
Give me some more info and I can facilitate you more. You can email me at icpmslabrat(a)yahoo.com.
Related Questions:
Nurse or Doctor or a moment ago clued-up?
Question give or take a few mood stabilizer? manic depression?
Is coumadin or heparin stronger?
What types of machines or techniques are used in this process?
Answers:
I actually do this everyday. I am a toxicologist and my specialty is elemental analysis.
There are several instruments that you use to analyze potassium. One is call an ICP-MS (Inductivley Coupled Plasma-Mass Spectrometer), annother is called an ICP-OES (Inductively Coupled Plasma-Optical Emmision Spectrometer), another is called a FAA (Flame Atomic Abosrption Spectrometer), and the other most common instrument is call a GFAA (Graphite Furnace Atomic Abosorbtion Spectrometer).
Personally for analyzing the K (Potassium) isotope alone, the most widely used instrument in medical labs is the ICP-MS, due to its accuracy. You take a fundamentally small (10-100 ul) sample of whole blood and dilute it with a prepared diluent mixture) after it is vortexed (mixed) and loaded on to the instrument's autosampler, and is then sampled and analyzed by the ICP-MS.
Is this somthing that you are actually trying to do contained by your class? Are you a student or a teacher? Is this college, High School? If you are just trying to do it in suggestion, then I can actually send you an SOP (standard operating procedure) for exactly how the process is done. But if this is somethin you are trying to truly carry out in the lab, then first of adjectives, OSHA (Occupational Health and Safety) usually does not allow students to handle biological specimens, and secondly, all of the instrumentation that is used to do this is VERY expensive. My ICP-MS alone cost around 150,000 dollars and the cheapest of them, the FAA, still costs around 40,000 dollars.
Give me some more info and I can facilitate you more. You can email me at icpmslabrat(a)yahoo.com.
Related Questions: