NEWS
Fassel to Receive 1988 Division Award Velmar A. F a s s e l , professor emeritus at Iowa State University, has been selected to receive the 1988 ACS Division of Analytical Chemistry Award in Spectrochemical Analysis. T h e award, sponsored by the PerkinElmer Corporation, was established in 1986 and is given to individuals who have advanced the field of spectrochemical analysis and optical spectrometry. T h e award, consisting of a $4000 stipend, a $1000 travel allowance, and a plaque, will be presented at the ACS fall national meeting in Los Angeles, Sept. 25-30. Fassel received a B.A. degree (1941) from Southeast Missouri State University and a Ph.D. degree in physical chemistry (1947) from Iowa State University. In 1947 he joined the staff of Iowa State University and the Ames Laboratory, a basic research center for the U.S. Department of Energy on the campus of Iowa State. From 1969 to 1983 he served as the deputy director of the Ames Laboratory and was awarded the title of Distinguished Professor in Sciences and Humanities in 1976. Fassel has authored more t h a n 200 publications on various aspects of atomic emission, absorption, and fluorescence spectroscopy, with emphasis on highresolution and high-sensitivity analytical techniques. He has received numerous awards and honors, including the Annual Medal Award of the Society for Applied Spectroscopy (1964), the Spectroscopy Society of Pittsburgh Award (1969), the Hasler and Anachem Awards (1971), the ACS Award in Analytical Chemistry (1979), the ACS Division of Analytical Chemistry Award in Chemical Instrumentation (1983), the AOAC Harvey W. Wiley Award (1983), an IR-100 Award (1986), the Lester W. Strock Award (1986), the Governor's Science Medal (1987), and the 1987 Eastern Analytical Symposium Award.
New SRM for Drug-Testing Laboratories A new standard reference material (SRM) has been developed by the National Bureau of Standards (NBS) for use by drug-testing laboratories t h a t analyze urine samples for evidence of marijuana. T h e material is designed to assist laboratories in determining the accuracy of their analyses. S R M 1507 was produced at the request of the Defense Department, which tests more than 3 million urine samples annually for a wide spectrum of drugs, including marijuana. S R M 1507 is the first in a series of urine-based SRMs to be developed by the NBS for the detection of illegal drugs. T h e active drug in marijuana, A 9 -tetrahydrocannabinol, is metabolized into several different byproducts. These metabolites can be detected in urine a m o n t h or more after the drug has been used. Although urine-based reference samples have been commercially available for some time,
S R M 1507 and its certified concentration of the principal urinary metabolite of marijuana, ll-nor-A 9 -tetrahydrocannabinol-9-carboxylic acid, now allows laboratories to trace their accuracy to a national standard. T h e S R M can also be used to verify the accuracy of reference materials t h a t are produced in house or commercially. According to Walter Vogl, senior policy analyst for alcohol and drug abuse prevention in the Defense Department, " T h e SRM's certified accuracy ensures t h a t the secondary reference materials used in our labs can be checked against a reliable primary reference standard. T h e credibility of the Defense Department drug testing system will be enhanced even more."
For Your Information At the Pittsburgh Conference, P e r k i n - E l m e r Corporation announced t h a t it will acquire N e l s o n Analytical, Inc. through a merger of the two companies. P e r k i n - E l m e r N e l s o n Systems, Inc., a subsidiary of Perkin-Elmer, will focus on market leadership in automation and systems integration for analytical laboratories. T h e company will be managed by David Nelson, founder of Nelson Analytical, and will comprise Nelson's existing organization and Perkin-Elmer's laboratory automation business. Bio-Rad Laboratories has received Food and D r u g Administration (FDA) approval to market urinary catecholamine (CATS), metanephrine (METS), and homovanillic acid (HVA) test kits for clinical highperformance liquid chromatography. T h e newly approved kits complement Bio-Rad's test kit for vanilmandelic acid (VMA), the first kit of its kind to receive FDA approval. Although the kits have been available for research testing for two years, the FDA ruling allows clinical laboratories to use these methods as in vitro diagnostic assays. According to J o h n Nelson, product manager for Bio-Rad, " T h e FDA approval is a real milestone for Bio-Rad and for clinical chromatography." For more information, contact J o h n Nelson at 415-724-7000. Two new computerized standard r e f e r e n c e databases for use in identifying the structures in materials are available. The N B S / S a n d i a / I C D D Electron Diffraction Database developed by the Bureau, Sandia National Laboratory, and the International Centre for Diffraction Data (ICDD) contains evaluated data for more t h a n 70,000 inorganic substances. T h e database is an important analytical tool for researchers using electron microscopes to identify unknown substances. T h e N B S Crystal D a t a b a s e contains complete crystallographic and chemical data on more than 120,000 compounds. In addition to its use in identifying unknown crystalline materials, the software program permits chemical data to be combined with crystal structure information to solve chemical problems. Both databases are available for lease in a variety of formats, including disks and tapes. For more information, contact the Office of Standard Reference Data, A323 Physics Building, N B S , Gaithersburg, Md. 20899 (301-975-2208). ANALYTICAL CHEMISTRY, VOL. 60, NO. 7, APRIL 1, 1988 · 437 A
