Everyone week we will be introducing one the technical experts of our Live Chat team! These are the actual individuals, or Phenoms as we like to call them, who you could have the chance of speaking with when you submit a Live Chat question. Our technical experts are all here to have your back and help with any technical question, no matter how difficult or easy it may seem.
Meet Live Chat Technical Expert – Genevieve Hodson
Located in Las Vegas, Nevada USA
Background
Genevieve graduated from the University of Texas with a BS in Chemistry located in her home town of Austin Texas. She spent 2 years of her undergraduate performing research in an Organic Chemistry Lab synthesizing intermediates. Out of school she spent 4 years as an Analytical Chemist in the QC and R&D Department of Cerilliant (a Sigma Millipore Company). There she worked with many analytical instruments but became an expert at LC by performing purity analysis, customer specific methods, validations, qc testing and stability studies on a wide range of small molecules including pharmaceuticals, pesticides, explosives and illegal substances. From there she moved to Los Angeles California where she worked at Johnson and Johnson and then a small dietary supplement company. After Genevieve spent a year living abroad in Israel raising her first son, she moved back to LA where she got hired as a Technical Specialist at Phenomenex. At Phenomenex she enjoys continuing to learn about chromatography every day through helping customer with all their chromatography needs!
Years at Phenomenex – 2 years
Years as one of the Technical Experts – 2 years
What is your craziest troubleshooting experience?
My favorite troubleshooting was with a customer who was working with our Phenex NY 0.2um 15mm, AF0-2207-52, membrane syringe filters. They were doing a method transfer on vanillin, method mentioned to use NY. After a week of LCMS testing, they found that Vanillin was high, hence troubleshoot and discovered that when the blank was run, filtered with Phenex NY, blank shows vanilln peak. But if a PTFE membrane was used no vanillin peak.
After researching further and troubleshooting with the customer we found that Vanillin is a degradent that can be from aldehydes in packaging reacting with the Nylon membranes. This was why the Vanillin peak was found in all vendors Nylon filters and why the PTFE filters do not exhibit the Vanillin in the blank at all.
You learn something new every day on this job as one of the technical experts, that is why I love it!
Can you give us an example of your favorite chat with a customer?
[16:18:31] Genevieve: Hello Amanda, how can I help you?
[16:19:06] Amanda: What sound does a microscopic cow make?
[16:19:22] Amanda: µ
[16:19:42] Amanda: But seriously, I need to know if columns have a specific shelf life.
[16:19:56] Amanda: for HPLC and GC columns.
[16:20:03] Genevieve: That was fun!
[16:20:56] Genevieve: We do not assign expiration dates for our LC or GC columns, but we do test them every year to make sure they still pass all qc testing
[16:21:35] Amanda: Excellent. I ask because we have a large inventory of columns that have not been used.
[16:21:50] Amanda: *have not been used since their purchase
[16:22:41] Amanda: Also, do you know that the Terms of Service link that hyperlinked at the beginning of the chat is broken?
[16:23:05] Genevieve: I will see if I am able to find this link for you
[16:23:16] Amanda: Sure.
[16:23:49] Genevieve: We also offer all the test mix that we use for the QC release testing on the CQA’s, if you needed to purchase them to run testing yourself
[16:24:12] Amanda: Could you send me a link to that item?
[16:24:31] Genevieve: https://www.phenomenex.com/Home/TermsOfUse
[16:24:42] Genevieve: Is this the Terms of Use you are looking for?
[16:24:58] Amanda: Yeah, I guess so.
[16:25:03] Genevieve: https://www.phenomenex.com/Home/TermsAndConditionsOfSale/UnitedStates
[16:25:11] Genevieve: There is also one as well
[16:25:14] Amanda: Neat.
[16:25:44] Genevieve: Do you know what columns you would be testing as the test mix does vary between columns
[16:26:12] Amanda: Oh, over a dozen different types between solid phases and lengths.
[16:26:25] Amanda: We have a serious backlog.
[16:26:27] Genevieve: Ah
[16:26:33] Genevieve: Hm
[16:27:02] Genevieve: Let me send you the ecatalog and tell you the page
[16:27:10] Amanda: Sweet.
[16:27:11] Amanda: Thank you
[16:28:12] Genevieve: www.phenomenex.com/ecatalog
[16:28:28] Genevieve: Page 414-415 are the standards for our LC columns
[16:28:56] Genevieve: Page 190 are the standards for our GC columns
[16:29:33] Genevieve: The most common standard for our LC columns is Part Number AL0-3045
[16:30:12] Genevieve: It is for most of our Luna, Synergi, Pordigy, Kinetex and Gemini columns
[16:30:47] Genevieve: Would you mind if I sent the chat over to our Marketing Department? The joke you told was really good!
[16:34:45] Amanda: Sure
[16:34:52] Amanda: I do not take credit for the joke
[16:35:01] Amanda: Thank you for helping me out, btw.
[16:35:06] Genevieve: It is still pretty great!
[16:35:35] Amanda: Oh, what about the HyperClone column?
[16:35:37] Genevieve: Of course! We are here to help and the joke made this chat bot very happy
[16:35:53] Amanda: Oh, darn, I was hoping you were a human
[16:36:12] Genevieve: We are very good at imitating humans
[16:36:23] Amanda: Are you going to be a Boo-lean ghost for Halloween? Dressed as ones and zeros?
[16:37:42] Genevieve: False, that’s my binary ghost costume idea
[16:37:50] Genevieve: Let me check on the HyperClone for you
[16:38:29] Amanda: Hehe, sounds good.
[16:41:07] Genevieve: The HyperClone uses AL0-3034
[16:41:45] Amanda: Great. i’ll make a note of this. Also, is there a way to check GC columns?
[16:42:01] Amanda: Or standards for SPE columns?
[16:42:08] Genevieve: Yes we have the test mix for GC columns as well
[16:42:20] Genevieve: It would be on page 190 of the catalog
[16:42:31] Genevieve: What GC columns do you have the most of?
[16:42:39] Amanda: Zebulons.
[16:43:01] Genevieve: Zebrons, ahh
[16:43:04] Amanda: No idea what specific types, yet, but I have an assistant who’s recording part numbers, etc.
[16:43:11] Amanda: Yes, Zebras.
[16:43:50] Genevieve: The most common is the AL0-5155, this is for ZB-1, ZB-5
[16:43:54] Amanda: Again, (un)fortunately large backlog of columns.
[16:44:13] Genevieve: Hopefully this helps
[16:44:15] Amanda: Excellent. Thank you for your assistance, friendly processor.
[16:44:20] Genevieve: For the SPE
[16:44:24] Genevieve: Let me see what I have
[16:44:29] Amanda: Sounds good!
[16:46:42] Genevieve: For our Strata and Strata-X products, we have a customer letter we are able to provide on the shelf life
Agent Genevieve has sent a file: PHEN-LETTER-14-007 v0 Expiration Date for Strata and Strata-X .pdf
[16:47:31] Amanda: Thank you, Agent Genevieve
[16:47:50] Genevieve: You are most welcome funny human Amanda
[16:48:18] Genevieve: Can I help with anything else?
[16:48:26] Genevieve: Did the catalog link work?
[16:48:37] Amanda: The catalog link worked perfectly.
[16:48:58] Genevieve: Awesome!
[16:49:26] Genevieve: I’ll be here if you need any other Part Numbers for any of your backlog of columns
[16:49:48] Amanda: Thank you. Have a good evening/ existence
[16:50:06] Genevieve: Thank you! You as well Amanda!
[16:50:55] Genevieve: Good bye, logging off
Have a technical question for Genevieve or one of our other technical experts? Start chatting now at www.phenomenex.com/chat.
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