ADVISORY: While a general community quarrantine is in effect due to the COVID19 pandemic, the Ateneo de Manila University has scaled down its operations, the NCIC facility included. Operating schedule and hours will be limited. Direct personal engagements of NCIC staff to clients will be kept to a minimum while we strive to serve our clients on a mostly remote set-up. More information on our COVID19 Advisory Page.

Please email your concerns on <ncic.sose@ateneo.edu>

About the NCIC


History

The National Chemistry Instrumentation Center (NCIC) is a research service center established in 1995 to provide support services in the areas of Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) spectrometry and Mass Spectrometry (MS) to researchers, industry and government regulators in the Philippines. The initial impetus for the NCIC was the Engineering and Science Education Program (ESEP) financed through the World Bank and administered by the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) paving way for the Ateneo Chemistry Department/NCIC to acquire state of the art high resolution GC-MS systems and the first NMR spectrometer in the country.

Our current equipment workhorses are the following:

  • Shimadzu GCMS QP2010 Ultra, a unit mass quad system acquired by the Chemistry Department in 2010 which supplanted its predecessor the Shimadzu QP , in use until 2008 and the ThermoFinnigan MAT95 High Resolution magnetic sector GC-MS system which was in active use until 2010.

  • Bruker Avance Neo 400 NMR spectrometer acquired in 2018 which replaced the JEOL Lambda 400 (the first NMR spectrometer in the country, in operation until 2015). Only the magnet of the previous system was retained. Acquired with project funds from DOST-PCHRD (Philippine Council for Health Research and Development).

  • CAMAG HPTLC Profiler System (acquired in 2015), with applicator, development chamber and system, visualizer to streamline our natural products' HPTLC analysis workflow. Acquired with project funds from DOST-PCHRD.


Purpose

The goal is to contribute to national development by providing readily available nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), mass spectrometry (MS) and high performance thin-layer chromatography (HPTLC) services to government, academe, and industry. NCIC also conducts its own research on important problems confronting various sectors especially in the fields of industry, health, and agriculture.


Services

The NCIC offers the following services using our Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) spectrometer, Gas Chromatograph-Mass Spectrometer (GC-MS and HPTLC Profiler:

​Product Quality Evaluation

Products are required to adhere to local or international standards and regulations, such as the CODEX for food products. The NCIC can help clients determine the level of compliance, as well as provide them with competent technical advice regarding their manufacturing process.

​Product Development

The NCIC can assist clients in the chemical analysis required for the licensing of new products. Aside from this, the NCIC can also help develop and validate QA/QC methods to evaluate the product's performance.

Characterization of Materials

Materials testing for import and export, customs and tariffs, and verification of supplied materials' quality may require MS and NMR analysis such as raw materials and products.

Environmental Analysis

Because the impact of human activity on the environment is an important concern, the ability to determine the presence of harmful chemicals in the environment is crucial. Clients can benefit from NCIC's experience in the examination of samples for pollutants such as pesticides, volatile organic compounds, PCBs, and others. A diverse range of samples such as soils, food, surfactants in water, and even gaseous vehicular emissions can also be scrutinized.

Partner Laboratories

The NCIC mainly caters to custom and specialized analyses and R&D service requests not offered by most service analytical laboratories in the country. Clients with routine and specific regulatory requirements may be advised to contact PIPAC , a private service analytical laboratory also located in the Ateneo LS campus.


Personnel

  1. Dr. Fabian Dayrit, Director and Project Leader

  2. Dr. Olivia Erin Buenafe, Consultant

  3. Dr. Armando Jerome de Jesus, Faculty-in-Charge (NMR)

  4. Dr. Gilbert Yu, Faculty-in-Charge (NMR)

  5. Dr. Ian Ken Dimzon, Faculty-in-Charge (GCMS Instrument Manager)

  6. Lolit Lagurin, Senior Research Staff

  7. Mark Joseph Garrovillas, Research Staff (NMR Instrument Manager)

  8. Grace Tantengco, Research Staff

  9. Philip Gabriel Opao, Research Staff