Leveraging Unique Capabilities and Capacities for Chemical Analyses of Diverse Food and Feed Matrices in Support of an Integrated Food Safety System

OverallProject SummaryThe California Animal Health and Food Safety Laboratory System (CAHFS) is California?s state veterinarydiagnostic laboratory, responsible for assuring the health of the state?s agricultural animals and safety offoods of animal origin. The CAHFS Toxicology Section occupies a unique position as a highly experiencedand well-equipped veterinary toxicology laboratory and is a natural fit as a partner to the FDA infurthering their mission of protecting food and animal feed in the U.S. from unsafe chemicalcontamination.CAHFS proposes to assist the agency through participation in several key activities as outlined in theFOA. First, the CAHFS Toxicology Section will provide significant surge capacity to the agency in theevent of an emergency incident involving intentional or accidental chemical contamination of humanfood or animal feed. The Section?s past performance in addressing food-related emergenciesdemonstrates its usefulness in these situations.Where new analytical capabilities and capacity are needed, the Toxicology Section will develop newmethods, participate in multi-lab method validations, evaluate new analytical platforms, and endeavorto address emerging food and feed safety issues with creativity and tenacity as requested. Theseactivities are critical in helping the agency address new chemicals of concern and in adopting moresensitive and selective detection capabilities. Evaluation of new analytical platforms assists the agency inidentifying more efficient methods of analysis, allowing for expanded analytical capacity.Additionally, CAHFS will perform surveillance analysis of livestock feeds produced in California. CAHFS isseeking funding for both sampling and analysis. The Toxicology Section will work in partnership with theCalifornia Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA), which is the state agency in charge of regulatinganimal feed. CDFA will provide samples taken as per FDA specifications to the laboratory for analysis.Test results involving samples which do not meet regulatory requirements will be reported to both theFDA and to CDFA. CAHFS understands that this funding opportunity involves a great deal of cooperationwith CDFA regulators as they become partners in providing samples. By building this type of cooperationand testing these samples, the Section will be able to assist the agency in quickly identifying emergingcontamination issues, preventing exposures to contaminated food or feed, ultimately preventing injuryto human and animal health.