Comment · Wed, September 25, 2019
.. A new Stanford-led study reveals that turmeric—a commonly used spice throughout South Asia—is sometimes adulterated with a lead-laced chemical compound in Bangladesh, one of the world's predominant turmeric-growing regions. It's a potent neurotoxin considered unsafe in any quantity
What they were answering
Zequl · 2 points
u/MisterYouAreSoDumb
u/NootropicsDepotCom
Is there any way to ensure that the products you are selling are not laced with this product? Have not looked any further into this topic, any clarification would be helpful. I currently use your turmeric + black pepper extract product.
u/MisterYouAreSoDumb
Yes, by properly testing it with the appropriate analytical methods. We test every batch with FTIR-ATR, UPLC, HP-TLC, ICP-MS, LOD, and water activity. You would see the lead chromate on the ICP-MS. We test every single batch of every single product on ICP-MS, which goes down to the ppb range. In fact, we do full mineral panels on a number of things in addition to the standard heavy metals panel. So for instance, we test every batch of adrafinil for the standard metals panel plus iron, chromium, sodium, etc. This is because different synthesis routes can lead to differing amounts of iron, which is why some batches are pink and some are white. For something like uridine monphosphate, which is a disodium salt, we do the full heavy metals panel plus sodium. You can't see metals or minerals on IR, HPLC/UPLC, or HP-TLC, as they don't have carbons or chromophores. Assay via HPLC/UPLC, when done properly with a reference standard, can see there are impurities. It's just not seeing the impurities themselves as signals. It's seeing them as a mathematical difference between the area under the curve of the sample in comparison to the reference standard. Many people don't know that. They assume HPLC/UPLC numbers are seeing everything, but the UV detector on those LCs can only see signals with chromophores. If you hook up that UPLC to a triple quad mass spec, then you can start seeing those signals. Even so, metals are always done via ICP. The detection limits for ICP-MS for metals is much more accurate, and the methods are common and validated.
1,152ppm lead is absolutely insane! These guys are adding lead chromate to make the tumeric more yellow. That's just dumb dumb dumb...