by Kesshia Peyton
Published: Tue, February 10, 2009 - 9:29 am CST
Last Updated: Tue, February 10, 2009 - 9:33 am CST
If you're a fan of crime shows, you might have seen investigators use fancy equipment to detect chemical traces. Those tools are mainly found in science labs, but they can also be used to make food testing faster and easier. Researchers have developed a technique called Desi. It picks up information right from the surface.
"The mist of water droplets picks up the chemicals off of the object and transfers them into the device," said Chemist Dr. R.Graham Cooks.
Once inside the machine, each molecule is weighed and identified. This is how we get information for food labels.
"The stuff that's printed on the, on the container, for example. Where does that come from? Okay, it comes from this kind of measurement," said Dr. Cooks.
Since food illnesses have been in the news lately, you might wonder if Desi can sort out salmonella from e-coli. The answer is, 'maybe.'
Right now, the results can be skewed by things the bacteria eat, but researchers are working out the bugs on that.
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