Tekmar Talk Blog

Total Organic Carbon (TOC) plays a vital role in today’s laboratory. There are two main types of TOC systems in today’s market: UV-Persulfate oxidation, and high temperature combustion oxidation. While these two systems have some areas of overlap, they offer different solutions for the laboratory. 

Read more to learn about the differences between these two systems.

Total organic carbon (TOC) analyzers play a significant role in our pharmaceutical testing laboratories and manufacturing facilities. Water is a major excipient and solvent used in pharmaceutical manufacturing and cleaning processes. It must be tested regularly for TOC. TOC analyzers are used globally to measure the amount of organic carbon that is present in water and in the equipment for cleaning validation. TOC is also used to test water sources for injection and has other uses within the pharmaceutical landscape.

What are the three worst enemies of low-level total organic carbon (TOC) analysis? Contamination, contamination, and contamination. Why stated three times? Because contamination can come from at least three different sources. The top three ways contamination can be inadvertently introduced into a TOC analyzer are reagents, laboratory glassware, and samples.

Pharmaceutical production entails strict quality control and precise analytical testing methods. The United States Pharmacopeia (USP), European Pharmacopeia (EP) and Japanese Pharmacopeia (JP) have promoted TOC analysis as the analytical technique to verify that cleaning validation, purified water (PW) and water for intravenous injection (WFI) meet the high standards of the pharmaceutical industry.

Total Organic Carbon (TOC) is defined as the amount of carbon bound in an organic compound and is often used as a non-specific indicator of water quality or cleanliness of pharmaceutical manufacturing equipment.

Teledyne Tekmar recently released a new guide that compares Total Organic Carbon analysis techniques. The guide provides important details for users and recommends the best instrument for your specific application. TOC analysis, which is used in a variety of labs, is a technique employed to determine water cleanliness and purity. It is a required test by the United States Pharmacopoeia (USP), European Pharmacopoeia (EP) and Japanese Pharmacopoeia (JP), and is frequently used to monitor wastewater, soils and drinking water safety.

Total Organic Carbon (TOC) analysis is a process used by environmental, pharmaceutical, university and petrochemical labs to determine water cleanliness and purity. It is required analysis by international pharmacopoeia for water, wastewater and soils applications. It is also starting to find traction in other industries such as cosmetics, even though there is not a regulatory requirement to use the technique.

An article written by Ben Dingwall, a business manager at TRB Chemedica, cites the focus on quality and safety within the cosmetics industry as the reason why TOC is being used more frequently. Adoption of this purification technique is driven by a number of cosmetics companies that are “aligning the process with Current Good Manufacturing Practices (cGMP).” These best practices help companies meet established guidelines recommended by agencies that authorize and license them to manufacture and sell cosmetics.

Teledyne Tekmar has added a new solids module to its Lotix TOC Combustion Analyzer. The Lotix Solids Sampler (LSS) Boat will allow the analyzer to measure carbon content in a variety of matrices, including soils, sludge, sediments, particulate-laden liquids and hard-to-oxidize samples.