Micro Imaging Technology, Inc. (MIT) have received AOAC Research Institute Performance Test Method™ (PTM) certification for the MIT 1000 System's (System) identification of Listeria species (PTM Certificate Number 060901).

AOAC RI's 'expert reviewers' performed a thorough evaluation of MIT's PTM validation study report that included 81 bacterial identification (ID) tests and resulted in a 99% accuracy score with only one incorrect ID. In addition, 406 ruggedness tests were conducted to evaluate the System's flexibility should a user vary the test procedure from that specified by MIT.

The PTM validation study report will be available for viewing on the AOAC RI Validated Methods web site (http://www.aoac.org/testkits/testedmethods.html). The study report will also be published in the Journal of AOAC INTERNATIONAL and a certification article will be published later this year in the AOAC Magazine, 'Inside Laboratory Management.'

The MIT 1000 System performs rapid and low cost microbial IDs in a process that is significantly different from all other ID methods as it does not rely on chemical or biological agents, conventional processing, fluorescent tags, gas chromatography or DNA analysis. The process is totally GREEN requiring only clean water and a sample of the unknown bacteria. Initially, the Company will target sales in the food industry where over $3 billion is spent in rapid ID testing annually and rising at nearly 10 percent per year.

The system uses the principles of light scattering to discriminate various bacteria cells that are suspended in filtered water. Incident laser light both reflects off the bacteria´s outer surface and penetrates the body of the bacterium, the light interacts with any structural features and eventually emerges from inside the cell. These light patterns are unique for each species and thereby create a signature that is captured and stored in a computer data base.

John Ricardi, MIT's Vice President and COO, stated, 'This certification enables MIT to aggressively begin marketing its System into the targeted food safety markets. Following Listeria certification, MIT's next goal is to achieve PTM certifications for the ID of E. coli and Salmonella as these three bacteria are responsible for most of the food bacterial contamination events worldwide. Since the AOAC RI Test Protocols should be similar, our goal is to have these in place later this year. Additional microbes will be certified as required by the market.'