At the AOAC mid-year meeting, members of the community came together to discuss emerging consumer devices for the analysis of food allergens and gluten. It was noted that in several cases results obtained by consumer devices and by analytical tests used routinely by food industry showed discrepancies. This can, in case of a false positive analysis by the consumer device, lead to brand damage of the producer, and, in case of a false negative, have severe health consequences for affected consumers. It was therefore suggested to develop a guidance document for consumer devices, which addresses the need for performance testing of any such devices according to set standards by the intended user groups and laboratory experts. Results would need to be compared with standard industrial tests. We would like to invite all stakeholders, in particular, experts in food allergen analysis, assay developers as well as consumer device manufacturers to contribute to this guidance document. If you are interested, please send an e-mail with your affiliation to aoac.allergens+CONSUMERDEVICES [at] gmail.com Nima Labs, Consumer Physics, Inc. (SCiO), Tellspec.
