Abigail Weaver recently presented a talk entitled, Fast paper-based technology for qualitative pharmaceutical testing, at the Fall 2013 American Chemical Society National meeting.  She highlighted previous work showing that paper-based tests perform well in the lab, greater than 90% sensitivity, in the identification of beta-lactam and anti-tuberculosis medications.  In more recent work done in collaboration with the FDA, the test cards produced chemical “fingerprints” for 44 different pharmaceuticals, 29 of them unique.  Within this group of pharmaceuticals a collection of substandard medicines, previously pulled from the pharmaceutical supply chain, were tested and substandards of four of the six pharmaceutical types were distinguished from the authentics by the test cards with 100% success.