Illicit Drug Analysis in the Field with a Portable Instrument “Toolkit”

Tuesday, October 7, 2025

2:50 PM - 3:10 PM EDT

Location: Meeting Room #2

Project Lead(s)

BK

Brooke W. Kammrath

Professor
University of New Haven andHenry C. Lee College of Criminal Justice and Forensic Sciences
West Haven, Connecticut, United States

Non-Presenting Author(s)

EG

Ella Galvan

University of New Haven
West Haven, Connecticut, United States
MY

Mei Yuan

Student
University of New Haven
West Haven, Connecticut, United States
AE

Ashlyn Evans

University of New Haven
West Haven, Connecticut, United States
DB

Desmond Brown

University of New Haven
Bridgeport, Connecticut, United States
SF

Samuel R. Friday

University of New Haven
Franklin, Massachusetts, United States
DK

Drew Kuroda

University of New Haven
West Haven, Connecticut, United States
AK

Alexander Klein

University of New Haven
West Haven, Connecticut, United States
JP

Jessica Persechino

University of New Haven
West Haven, Connecticut, United States
JB

Jessica Behn

University of New Haven
West Haven, Connecticut, United States
JN

Jon Naples

Connecticut State Police, Emergency Services Unit - K9 Division
Meriden, Connecticut, United States
DF

Debbie Fuller

Chief Marketing and Administrative Officer
Refana, Inc.
Las Vegas, Nevada, United States
IR

Isabelle Radgen-Morvant

NIRLABS
Lausanne, Vaud, Switzerland
RC

Richard A. Crocombe, MA, PhD (he/him/his)

Principal
Crocombe Spectroscopic Consulting
WINCHESTER, Massachusetts, United States

Project Lead(s)

PL

Pauline E. Leary, PhD

CBRNE Subject Matter Expert
Noble, inc
Stanfordville, New York, United States

In fifteen words or less, explain the significance of this contribution (Novel Aspect).:

A toolkit of portable instruments can reliably detect and identify illicit drugs in the field.

Abstract Text:

Portable instruments offer numerous advantages for combatting the illicit drug market in the field. The real-time data provided by portable instruments, which can identify both bulk and trace components of a mixture, can be of value to first responders given the modern dynamic illicit drug landscape which contains highly dangerous and novel psychoactive substances. Still, given the diversity of commercially available portable instruments, there remains questions regarding which portable technologies are best for illicit drug identification and what are the best practices for their implementation in the field.

This research evaluated 8 different field portable methods for the analysis of a range of adjudicated seized drug samples: (1) field color tests, (2) a portable FT-IR spectrometer, (3) a handheld Raman spectrometer equipped with a 1064 nm laser, (4) a handheld NIR spectrometer; (5) a portable GC-MS equipped with a quadrupole mass analyzer, (6) a portable GC-MS equipped with an ion-trap mass analyzer, (7) a portable HPMS, and (8) a portable MS. Samples were also analyzed using traditional laboratory benchtop GC-MS and FT-IR instrumentation, for comparison. This research demonstrated the reliable detection and identification of both bulk and trace components of seized illicit drugs when at least two field deployable devices are employed. Since multiple instruments can be used in combination to achieve these results, a “toolkit” approach is recommended, which agrees with the work on illicit medications and foreign unapproved pharmaceutical products by Lanzarotta et al. (2021)¹. The toolkit approach provides numerous advantages, most notably its flexibility for use by agencies with a range of resources and its consistency with recommendations by the SWGDRUGand ASTM E2329: Standard Practice for the Identification of Seized Drugs².

References:

1. Lanzarotta, A., Kern, S., Batson, J., Falconer, T.M., Fulcher, M., Gaston, K.W., Kimani, M.M., Lorenz, L., Morales-Garcia, F., Ranieri, N. and Skelton, D., 2021. Evaluation of “Toolkit” consisting of handheld and portable analytical devices for detecting active pharmaceutical ingredients in drug products collected during a simultaneous nation-wide mail blitz. Journal of Pharmaceutical and Biomedical Analysis, 203, p.114183.

3. ASTM International. 2017. Standard Practice for Identification of Seized Drugs. ASTM E2329-17