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Developing Resources to Facilitate Expanded Application of Non-Targeted Analysis Methods
Citation:
McCord, J., S. Nason, Y. Feng, J. Sobus, C. Fisher, R. Marfil-Vega, A. Flynn, J. Sloop, N. Keaton, AND S. Bayen. Developing Resources to Facilitate Expanded Application of Non-Targeted Analysis Methods. Association of Public Health Laboratories Annual Conference, Sacramento, CA, May 22 - 25, 2023.
Impact/Purpose:
Non-Targeted analysis is a highly useful analytical tool for numerous fields of experimental research and environmental monitoring, including environmental monitoring, food safety evaluation, human exposure and biomonitoring, forensic science, epidemiology, and chemical threat detection. The Benchmarking and Publications for Non-Targeted Analysis working group (BP4NTA) has both developed tools for applications of NTA in unique scenarios and engaged with stakeholders from a variety of industry sectors to determine their utility and pathways to align future NTA tool development.
Description:
Non-targeted analysis (NTA) using gas or liquid chromatography coupled with high resolution mass spectrometry is a powerful analytical technique that is increasingly used to study organic contaminants in situations where it is impossible or impractical to have analytical standards for all analytes. Common applications include environmental monitoring, food safety evaluation, human exposure and biomonitoring, forensic science, epidemiology, and chemical threat detection, and there is enormous potential for increased use in many analytical contexts. However, methods for ensuring quality control, accuracy, and reproducibility of NTA results are still in development for this emerging technique. The Benchmarking and Publications for Non-Targeted Analysis working group (BP4NTA) is focused on increasing use of and improving the quality of NTA. We have recently published several products that contribute to this goal including the NTA Study Reporting Tool (SRT), a manuscript that proposes performance metrics for NTA, and a website that includes substantial NTA reference content. As additional BP4NTA efforts develop and progress, the Stakeholders Subcommittee is working to engage with data producers and users from various fields through a series of meetings and surveys with a main goal of learning about drivers and barriers of NTA adoption and data use. Results from this effort will be used to inform and prioritize future BP4NTA activities, ensuring that BP4NTA-generatedresources will be of value to the broader scientific community. To date, we have hosted three separate stakeholder meetings, with representatives from food and agriculture laboratories, medical devices regulators, and rapid responders. Future stakeholder meetings will include employees of commercial environmental laboratories, regulatory risk assessors, epidemiologists, students/trainees and others. Preliminary stakeholder survey results indicate high interest in the use of current BP4NTA resources such as our website and proposed performance metrics, demand for data processing tools such as databases and libraries, and enthusiasm for additional strategies to demonstrate data quality and study reproducibility. Continued feedback from NTA-adjacent stakeholders, including those in the Association of Public Health Laboratories (APHL) community will help us to further refine our efforts towards the most useful tools for broadening NTA implementation and use.
