Latest News and Application Notes

Alcohol is one of the oldest intentionally-crafted drinks in the world, with evidence of fermented drinks existing as early as 10,000 BC. It has remained an important cultural touchstone around the world, with most countries having some version of "going out for drinks" as a common social activity. While there are three main types of alcoholic beverages—wine, beer, and spirits—beer consistently remains the most popular alcoholic drink around the world and third most popular drink after water and tea. Recent Gallup polls find that 38% of Americans prefer beer to wine (30%) and spirits (29%).

Since the 1800s, there have been two major methods of protein determination, the Kjeldahl and the Dumas methods. Both methods measure the nitrogen in a sample and use mathematics to convert that into the protein content. Though the Dumas method was older, the Kjeldahl method quickly took off in popularity due to its relative ease of performance. However, as new technologies developed, the Dumas method began gaining in popularity.

The price of crude oil is one of the great drivers of our economy. At a minimum, the price of all goods includes costs of transporting them from manufacturer to consumer. But the price of crude oil and other oil materials can feel fickle, increasing and decreasing with supply or demand or even just market sentiment. Natural disasters or humanitarian crises can drastically impact availability or demand, sending prices hurtling skyward or crashing down. No refinery can control the entire market. All a refinery can do is operate their facilities in the most efficient and optimized manner. Doing that, however, requires an accurate way to monitor their process.

Coal in your stocking might be Santa's go-to punishment for naughty children, but surely he wouldn't just be giving away higher-quality coal! In the right field, a good, high-quality coal could be an ideal present! In order to separate the naughty coal from the nice, carbon, hydrogen, and nitrogen determinations are required.

Over the last thirty years, the Dumas combustion method for analyzing protein content in food has been gaining popularity against the classic Kjeldahl wet chemical digestion and titration method. The Dumas method has several advantages over the Kjeldahl method: it is much faster, with much lower operating costs, no real safety issues, and no toxic waste produced. However, there is a debate over which of the two main approaches to the Dumas method is better: a vertical or a horizontal combustion furnace.

A web of factors contributes to a good crop, but the importance of carbon and nitrogen cannot be overstated. From soil to fertilizer to the plant matter itself, the mix of carbon and nitrogen play key roles in the development and growth of the plant. Knowing the carbon and nitrogen levels in every aspect of your field can help you maintain quality control over the end result.

98% of the world's soybean meal is used as animal feed, principally as a protein supplement. With the importance of protein in animal growth and development, knowing what's in your soybean meal is vitally important. There is more to protein than the crude protein concentration number, however. If an animal can't digest the protein, if it isn't a 'soluble' protein, then it doesn't actually provide the nutritional value needed. LECO's FP828 is capable of both total and soluble protein analyses.

LECO announces the addition of hydrogen analysis capabilities to the 828 series, which will transform the way users determine carbon, hydrogen, and nitrogen in a variety of petrochemical and other organic materials. The CHN828 maintains the core capabilities and performance of previous generations of LECO macro combustion instruments while possessing key improvements in throughput, uptime, and reliability. By incorporating state-of-the-art hardware and an on-board touch-screen software platform with rapid analysis times, the CHN828 operates at a low cost-per-analysis and allows users to easily handle the most demanding sample applications.

How efficient is your workflow when it comes to food samples? Are you sure you're seeing everything your sample has to offer? Learn how LECO has been expanding what is possible when it comes to food safety analyses with a free series of webinars.

All of these webinars are now available as on-demand recordings on our website.

Why do you use the sample container that you use? Is it something you've ever thought about? Sample containers and crucibles are both wonderfully simple, to hold your sample without influencing the analysis, and wonderfully complex... to hold your sample without influencing the analysis.

But are you using the best container for your type of sample?