Mangaluru varsity’s CARER labs help check authenticity of biogenic products

The facility aids industries that otherwise depend on laboratories in Europe or the USA to test commercial products, saving time, reducing costs and overcoming the difficulties associated with sending samples abroad

Industries, manufacturers, suppliers and exporters dealing with products naturally extracted from plants (biogenic) have been approaching Mangalore University for sometime now. It is to validate and ensure that the products they are dealing with are derived from natural-sourced ingredients and free from adulteration.

The genuineness of the products is tested at the Centre for Advanced Research in Environmental Radioactivity (CARER) at the university by conducting the Carbon-14 test. The centre, having six laboratories, extended its Carbon-14 test facility recently to petrochemical industries to test the bio-fuel content in blended fuels (a combination of biofuel and conventional petroleum fuel) and aeroplane turbine fuel (also referred to as sustainable aviation fuel).

Mineral exporting and importing industries, glass manufacturers and mining industries also use the facilities at the CARER to test radio activity level in their products by using gamma spectrometry method.

CARER background

It was in 2014 that the Board of Research in Nuclear Sciences (BRNS), under the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE), funded about rupees six crore to the university for Carbon-14 studies in the environmental matrices as part of radiation protection studies in the Kaiga region, where a nuclear power plant is operational.

As a result, the CARER took birth at the university in June, 2015. The centre was established for research on radioecology and radiation protection and to support fellow researchers from other institutions of the county. One of the BRNS funding objectives was to standardise methods for Carbon 14 and tritium (a radioactive isotope of hydrogen that is unstable and emits beta radiation) measurements in nuclear power plants. The centre was dedicated to the nation as a national facility on June 10, 2016.

“The facilities are now of great help to industries that otherwise depend on laboratories in Europe or the USA to test commercial products, saving valuable time, reducing costs and overcoming the difficulties associated with sending the samples abroad for testing,” Karunakara Naregundi, Professor and Head, CARER, told The Hindu.

In addition to collaborating with many advanced laboratories worldwide, the centre serves the research needs of various research groups from national laboratories, institutions and universities, he said. The CARER is now celebrating its decennial year.

Carbon-14 testing

Recently, the adulteration of natural products with synthetic alternatives or petrochemical-derived (geogenic) products has increased, and end-users reject such products if they are exported. The Carbon-14 test is beneficial for those who deal with biogenic products, which are in great demand in other countries, to ascertain that they are free from adulteration.

The CARER measures the Carbon-14 levels to determine the percentage of biogenic ingredient in the product to quantify the extent of adulteration of natural products from geogenic or synthetic impurities.

The Carbon-14 testing has become highly useful to industries dealing with the export/import of a variety of materials such as turmeric, vanilla extract, lavender oil, palmarosa oil, lemongrass oil, sandalwood oil, lavender oil, jasmine oils, varieties of edible oils, caffeine, etc.

Pharmaceutical and herbal medicinal industries are also using the facility at the university to test the purity of medicinal products marketed as natural plant-derived products.

To petrochemical industries

Prof. Naregundi said, “The CARER recently extended its Carbon-14 testing facility to the petrochemical industries to test the bio-fuel content in blended fuels and sustainable aviation fuel, use of which is promoted by the Government of India since such fuels have smaller carbon footprint than conventional jet fuel. CARER is the only facility in the country offering such testing service to the private industries.”

Explaining the scientific basis of the Carbon-14 test, Prof. Naregundi said that Carbon-14 is a radioactive isotope of Carbon that is formed naturally in the upper atmosphere because of the interaction of high-energy cosmic rays with nitrogen. The carbon-14 thus produced is present in carbon dioxide form and hence present in equilibrium in all living organisms. The products derived from plant or animal origin contain the known specific activity of radioactive isotope Carbon-14.

“A 100% biobased product sourced from the plant will exhibit a Carbon-14 content of 100 pMC (percent modern Carbon) or 226 Bq/kgC (Becquerel per kilogram of Carbon). On the other hand, a product derived from 100% petrochemical or fossil fuel materials does not contain any Carbon-14 because they are millions of years old (hence all the Carbon-14 present in such material have undergone radioactive decay), and, therefore, the Carbon-14 test will yield a value of 0 (zero) pMC” he said.

One of the methods of adulterating natural products (derived from plant or animal origin) is mixing cheaper petrochemical-derived synthetic alternatives. Therefore, by subjecting the product to a Carbon-14 test, the percentage of Carbon-14 present in a material is quantified.

“This test is the only method for quantifying petroleum-derived adulterants or systematic products in natural-sourced products for which conventional chemical techniques and other instrument-based methods such as gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) are not helpful. However, the Carbon-14 testing cannot distinguish between natural sources (for example, a mixture prepared by mixing two types of plant-derived materials), which can be achieved through conventional methods,” Prof. Naregundi added.

“Many of the products sent by industries and tested at CARER have turned out adulterated or of synthetic/geogenic origin,” he said. This allowed the exporters to act immediately to take necessary corrective steps.

He said that the CARER has standardised methods based on thermal oxidation and liquid scintillation spectrometry for Carbon-14 measurements in various products. Though this is not an American Society for Testing and Material (ASTM) recognized method, it is capable of quantifying the natural and synthetic components in the products, and the export industries highly benefitfrom this.

“Efforts are on to establish a facility at the centre for testing the products as per ASTM requirements very soon through industry participation,” Prof. Naregundi said.

Varsity-industry partnership

Prof. P. L. Dharma, Vice Chancellor of the university, told The Hindu that it is a matter of great satisfaction that the CARER has been developed with advanced facilities that cater to the needs of the industries and support them in confidently exporting products. “It is a rare example of a university-industry partnership for mutual benefits,” he said, adding that the university plans to strengthen the centre further.

K. Raju Mogaveera, Registrar (administration) of the university, commented that the CARER had become a financially self-sustaining research centre and is developing through the research projects awarded by the BRNS, DAE and Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd. (NPCIL) and through the service provided to the industries. He thanked the funding agencies for the support to the university.

Published - October 25, 2024 09:00 am IST