Chemistry: molecular biology and microbiology – Measuring or testing process involving enzymes or... – Involving nucleic acid
Patent
1995-02-27
1997-07-01
Zitomer, Stephanie W.
Chemistry: molecular biology and microbiology
Measuring or testing process involving enzymes or...
Involving nucleic acid
435 4, 435 71, 435 15, 436 56, 436 57, 436501, 436518, 436526, 436527, 536 253, C07H 2100, C12Q 168
Patent
active
056437285
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
This application corresponds to PCT/GB93/01822 filed on Aug. 26, 1993. The latter application is a continuation application claiming priority, in turn, from GB Serial Number 9218131.2 filed on Aug. 26, 1992.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
This invention relates to the marking of materials and in particular to a method of marking a liquid and subsequently detecting that the liquid has been marked.
There is a widespread requirement to be able to trace the path taken by a given material as it moves from one location to another. In general terms, two broad categories of material movement are recognised:
(i) The movement of materials as a result of natural processes occurring in the biosphere, e.g., the flow of water in sub-surface aquifers, the movement of sediments etc.
(ii) The movement of materials which have been manufactured by man, i.e., items which do not occur in the natural environment or which are natural materials being transported as a result of man's activities. The former would include any item produced by man, and the latter items such as grain and other food materials, mineral ores and petroleum products, such as crude oil.
In all these situations, there may be reasons why it is necessary to develop specific procedures to trace these movements. It may be that direct observation is not possible, e.g., when following the path of an underground stream. It may be that it is necessary to monitor the movement of goods without the direct knowledge of the transporters or, for legal reasons, to prove that the appearance of a material at a particular point in the biosphere was due to the same material originating from a known starting point.
For example, it is undesirable and in certain circumstances illegal, for petroleum materials to leak from storage sites or transportation containers and contaminate the natural environment. Petrol storage tanks, e.g., at petrol filling stations, are usually located underground. Should one of these tanks develop a leak, the loss of material will eventually be detected, either by audits on the material being added to and removed from the storage tank, or by detection of spilt, leakage material at some site adjacent the storage tank area. Since the tanks are underground, visual inspection is not normally possible and it is a costly procedure to excavate successive tanks to determine which tank is the cause of the leakage. The normal procedure would be to develop a protocol whereby a known marker, e.g., a dye, is added to the tanks to determine, by tracing the movement of the dye, which tank is the cause of the leakage. Cheaper remedial action can then be taken to deal with the identified leaking tank. One feature of this procedure is that, in order to know which tank is leaking, the markers added to each tank must be different, i.e., if there are six tanks, then six different dyes, each recognisable by some property which can be accurately and uniquely determined, need to be used. The greater the number of individual components in a particular system, the greater the number of unique traces that need to be used to make the necessary distinction between the paths taken by different leaks from different tanks.
Another example concerns the identification of the source of pollution in the sea and waterways from spills of petroleum materials, particularly oil. The environmental damage caused by accidental oil spills and deliberate dumping of oil by ships, e.g., when washing tanks, is significant and there is a growing demand for the culprits to be identified and to be held responsible for clean-up operations. One of the problems associated with the identification of oil samples in large volumes of aqueous media, such as an oil slick on the sea, is that any marker introduced into oil has a tendency to partition out or be dispersed in the aqueous phase, rendering collection and identification of the marker particularly difficult.
A further example illustrating the need to monitor the movement of a liquid from one location to another is
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patent: 4510244 (1985-04-01), Parks et al.
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patent: 4672040 (1987-06-01), Josephson
patent: 4978625 (1990-12-01), Wagner et al.
patent: 5451505 (1995-09-01), Dollinger
International Search Report; PCT/GB93/01822; 12 Jan. 1994; G. Griffith.
Minton John Edward
Slater James Howard
Tran Paul B.
Zitomer Stephanie W.
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