Your bioanalytical data are only as good as your samples

“Good data can only come from good samples. Technology is now available to collect, transport, store and document samples like never before. It is critical that these new tools be given as much attention as the bioanalytical instruments to which the samples will be fed.” As an Assistant Professor of analytical chemistry, one of us would defer to the old guard, the grey beards, who implored future analytical chemists to be sure to examine a representative sample. An assay of a gold nugget or piece of copper ore did not imply the entire mountain was made of gold or copper....