Located at 11,450 feet (3,490 meters), more than two miles above sea-level, a pharmaceutical testing laboratory in Lhasa, Tibet recently installed oxygen and water vapor permeation equipment from Mocon, Inc.
According to Mocon, the lab represents Mocon’s highest altitude installation.The units will be used to measure package permeation for traditional Tibetan herbal remedies and conventional pharmaceuticals.
The Lhasa laboratory received a Mocon OX-TRAN® 2/21 ML and a PERMATRAN-W® Model 3/33 MG Plus unit. Both are engineered to test permeation of either flat materials or finished packages/devices such as vials, pouches, bottles, blister cavities, and syringes. This equipmentvwill be used primarily for high-barrier testing of packaging structures with either aluminum foil or metalized layers.
The OX-TRAN 2/21 system also features barometric pressure compensation that “normalizes” the test results to sea level to ensure uniform test results worldwide, regardless of altitude or weather conditions. The OX-TRAN 2/21 also uses a patented coulometric sensor (COULOX®) to detect oxygen transmission. It provides parts-per-billion sensitivity even in the presence of water vapor.
The newly launched PERMATRAN-W® Model MG 3/33 Plus water vapor transmission rate unit offers automatic relative humidity (RH) capability. Its software interface enables the instrument to measure precise relative humidity conditions, which are critical to understanding how barriers will perform in real-world conditions.
The installation is part of an order Mocon received earlier from China’s State Food & Drug Administration (SFDA) to supply 20 provincial pharmaceutical testing centers with oxygen and water vapor permeation units.
Mocon established an office, laboratory, and service center in Shanghai in 2007 to help provide leading-edge permeation technology for growing economies in the Asia-Pacific region. Additionally, Mocon is supported in the region by its agent, Danbell Equipment Company Lte., Beijing.
