Detection of Allergenic Substances with MCE-202 MultiNA

Japan is the world’s earliest adopter of a displaysystem for foods containing allergens. In April, 2001 itbecome mandatory that food labels include likelyallergens, and in June, 2008, two additional foodarticles, prawn and crab, were added to that list oflikely allergens. The dissemination of allergen-relatedinformation to the consumer using this label display ismeant to help avert the possibility of allergicresponses and harm to health beforehand. Therefore,if specific substances are included or mixed in amongthe other ingredients, even at ultra small quantities,the label is required to inform the consumer to that fact.Among the allergenic substances required to bementioned on the label, those that can be detected byqualitative PCR are wheat, buckwheat, peanuts,prawn and crab. Here we conducted amplification ofallergen-related genes by PCR using extracted DNAas the template, according the method specified byThe Japanese Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare(Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare Notification"Regarding the testing method for foods containingallergenic substances," No. 0724, Publication No. 1issued by the Dept. of Food Safety, July 24, 2009).Here we introduce the detection of these substancesusing the MCE-202 MultiNA Microchip ElectrophoresisSystem for DNA/RNA analysis.