NSF will enhance testing for contamination
to detect any contamination in dietary supplements for clients.
The testing agency announced it is pairing up with Neogen, who recently acquired a microbial test system, Soleris, for identifying contamination. NSF and Neogen said they would offer comprehensive validation tests and services for ensuring products meet label content claims and do not contain contaminants such as unintended microbes, lead and heavy metals.
NSF recently published a new edition of NSF/ANSI Standard 173 after completing a study, which verified equivalency between Neogen's Soleris microbial test protocols and traditional USP plate-counting methods when testing dietary supplements for contamination.
"Including our rapid testing protocols in the NSF standard will allow more microbial testers to discover the obvious speed and significant labor-reducing benefits of the Soleris system over traditional methods," said Ed Bradley, vice president of food safety at Neogen.
According to NSF, its microbiology lab will use the Soleris equipment to develop additional validation assays to detect microbial contamination.
The system measures microbial growth by monitoring pH and other biochemical reactions that generate a color change as microorganisms grow and metabolize. This process enables operators to easily identify, monitor and detect any problem area.
"This is key for companies who do not have the resources in-house to conduct comprehensive validation testing of dietary supplements for yeast and mold, total aerobic count and Enterobacteriaceae," said NSF chief technical officer and senior vice president, Lori Bestervelt. "The Soleris test system will also play an important role in quickly detecting foodborne bacteria."
