(none)

[S.Mitchell Halloran]

Before I get to the many subjects I am addressing here, I will first say that 
if you want me to read your answers to the subjects I addressed above, you 
need to send your response by e-mail as I am not subscribing to methods-and-
reagents (for reasons I won't get into).  For people who are interested in 
knowing the responses I get, please send e-mail to me to request your interest 
in the answers:  I will post a summary of the answers I get and give credit to 
the responder(s) (with their permission to post their names).  Responders to 
my questions can likewise post their answers to the newsgroup as well, but 
please send a copy of the post by e-mail to me.


I have a number of subjects here, so please pay attention:

(1) A nutrition scientist studying endemic goiter/thyroid dysfunction has come 
to the clinical/semi-research lab where I work and sought my advice for making 
determinations of urinary iodine levels.  When I say "iodine," I naturally 
refer to the IODIDE anion, as I doubt biologically utilizable iodine comes in 
any of the oxyhalide forms (iodates).  [Of course, I always get into trouble 
when I doubt in this manner, and I sure there is someone hard at work out 
their studying the physiological importance of iodates will become indignant 
at my ignorance and upbraid me for my arrogant assumptions; I only ask that 
you please don't do it publicly, as my ego is fragile.]  I am currently 
checking for methods for doing iodide determinations using CE (capillary 
electrophoresis), but I would also like to know of the latest method giving 
decent sensitivity and involving no special, costly equipment.  I want to know 
of the latter type of method since this nutrition scientist is lucky to have a 
spectrophotometer to work with at her university, and so the most sensitive 
colorimetric method just might suit her.  We may also nonetheless do it by CE, 
so anyone doing iodide determinations from urine samples using CE should write 
to me with their method and their advice.

(2) I have been asked to develop or to use a methodology for doing water 
quality analysis (inorganic cations/transition metals/other metals; inorganic 
anions; maybe some neutral organic and charged organics later down the road) 
using CE as well, so anyone doing this type of work is urged to write me.  I 
am already reading the papers of the few groups reporting in this area, so if 
you read this group, please drop me a line with what you are doing now and 
what is definitive, as if something ever remains definitive.

(3) If there is a newsgroup devoted to general or special work with CE, will 
someone please tell me?  I have finally come around to learning what this 
technique is all about after promising myself to learn what all the fuss was 
about, and now that I have toy to experiment with, it all looks great to me.  
This lab is using a BioRad BioFocus 3000, so people with experience good or 
bad with this product are encouraged to write me.  (It is customary to say 
that I am not advertising the product, and I am not.  The thing was here 
before I was hired, and I am not really sure how good it works.  That's why I 
am asking you.)

(4) I would like to know of a newsgroup for people doing clinical laboratory 
work.  The owner of the lab I work for is more of an academic than a 
businessman, and he is always wanting to use the latest kit or to develop a 
methodology for determining this analyte in this or that body fluid or 
compartment.  I am not a licensed clinical biochemist/medical technologist and 
it would help now and then if I knew that nobody was using coupled enzyme 
assays anymore to do serum glucose determinations (they do in this lab).


My sincere apologies to those for having to read such a long, multi-subject
message.  It's just that, in my perversity, I wanted the message to be longer
than the header.


Mitch Halloran

somewhere in Ankara
Republic of Turkey

Kustaha beylik vermisler; once babasini asmis.  (Turkish proverb)
(The arrogant man was appointed to an official post,
 and the first man he hung was his father.)
------------------------------------------------------------