Debunked: The Truths Behind Pesticide Testing

Webinar Summary

Testing cannabis and cannabinoid products to meet, and ideally exceed, regulatory requirements is challenging and requires a suite of chemical analysis systems with commensurate expert operators.

Many operators find that the most challenging of these tests is residual pesticide analysis. This is because cannabis and hemp and products derived therefrom present a complex composition of native chemicals that range in concentration up to hundreds of milligrams per gram. The complexity of the matrix challenges the selectivity and sensitivity of even the most sophisticated tandem mass spectrometers.

Further challenges to pesticide testing include disparate target lists, a wide range in action (not to exceed) levels, sample preparation, and a need for a liquid and gas phase mass spectrometry for the proper analysis of the range of pesticides.

This presentation will dispel the myths about residual pesticide testing in cannabis and cannabinoid products. We will clearly demonstrate how and why a single-stream sample preparation technique with a two-platform analysis working in parallel offers a robust, high-throughput methodology far superior to a single-system approach with minimal sample clean-up.

During this webinar, we will discuss:

A novel single-stream sample preparation technique amenable to both LC/MS/MS and GC/MS/MS
Why both LC/MS/MS and GC/MS/MS are required for certain pesticides on regional regulatory lists
Definition of, and rationale for, comprehensive pesticide analyses

Speaker Information:

Anthony Macherone
Sr. Scientist and Cannabis Applications Technical Lead, Agilent Technologies, Visiting Professor, The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine