Technology for Growth

Nick has appeared in a documentary film about "in-silico" methods for chemical risk assessment. The film was made as part of the EU project "Orchestra" which aims to disseminate recent research on computer-based methods for evaluating the toxicity of chemicals (http://www.orchestra-qsar.eu/). The documentary can be viewed in 4 distinct clips on the Orchestra site (http://www.orchestra-qsar.eu/qsars-in-reach-video). A still of Nick's interview is shown below.

The new version of the OECD QSAR Toolbox has been released.

The Toolbox is a free applicaton which allows the user to build categories of chemical compounds and to predict a wide range of ecotoxicological and toxicological endpoints. It is a highly functionalised application which requires considerable expert knowledge to obtain useful and meaningful results. Contact us for further details, advice and training.

A book chapter entitled "SAR Based Computational Models as Decision Making Tools in Bioremediation" by Nick and Prof Qasim Chaudhry of the UK Food & Environment Research Agency has just been published. It appears in the book, "Organic Xenobiotics and Plants. From Mode of Action to Ecophysiology" published by Springer. Details can be found at here . A draft of our chapter with extra illustrations that could not be accommodated in the book version can be accessed via the "QSAR in Bioremediation" link on the Navigational panel to the left.

Ken, having been a key author in the 1999 and 2003 versions of the The Grain Storage Guide (GSG), is likely to be involved in the planned 2011 ‘update’.For those not familiar with this publication it is the Home-Grown Cereals Authority’s industry ‘bible’ on grain storage (– see http://www.hgca.com/cms_publications.output/2/2/Publications/Publication... ).

Ken has continued his involvement in legal cases concerning distressed cargoes and problems in bulk storage of cereals. Good news was received at the end of August on a long-running case (the cargo was landed in December 2002!) in that the Tribunal found in favour of our clients – and that the fundamental factor in the success was the decision that a pre-existing infestation of storage beetle pests lead to the dispute; and so the receiver (our client) could not be held responsible. 

A longstanding TfG customer in the food industry has renewed our annual contract but at a much increased time input. Ken leads, with Nick’s information mining backup, in providing support on pest control issues, including independent audit of the client’s pest control contractors’ performance, assessment and design of warehouse and bulk storage facilities. We also provide technical support for example on  pesticide issues, mycotoxin contamination, sampling and pest monitoring.

Nick has recently been a co-author on a paper entitled, "Global QSAR Models of Skin Sensitisers for Regulatory Purposes". The paper is part of a Special Edition of the Online Journal Chemistry Central, covering the outputs from the EU project CAESAR. The journal is open access and all the CAESAR papers can be downloaded free at: http://www.journal.chemistrycentral.com/supplements/4/S1

TfG, through Ken continue to be successful in advising clients on legal issues relating to food commodities. Ken has recently been involved in a number of cases (for which details cannot be provided here for obvious reasons). The combination of Ken's forensic thouroughness in the field and Nick's relentless chasing down of supporting information, seems to be a fruitful approach and our success rate to date is impressive. If you have need of this service please use the "Contact us" link on the left side of the page.

Computer-based toxicological assessments of chemicals are preferred to animal testing in new legislation such as REACH and regulations for pesticides and cosmetics. As well as QSAR there are other computational techniques used to predict a whole range of toxicological properties of chemicals. These include expert systems, read across and trend analysis. Some of the available software  tools for predictive toxicology are discussed in the "Predictive Toxicology" link in the Navigation pane to the left of this page. TfG have considerable experience in the use of many of these tools so for advice, training or chemical assessments please use the "Contact us" link.

In conjunction with Professor Q Chaudhry at the UK Food & Environment Research Agency, Nick has written a book chapter called "QSAR and Expert Systems as Tools in Bioremediation". The chapter will appear in the  Springer Ecophysiology Series book  "Organic xenobiotics and plants - from the cellular to the ecosystem level". More details when available.