Patent ID: 7495214

Claim:
A method for authenticating an imaging material used in an ink jet printing apparatus, comprising: tagging a drum maintenance fluid with at least one fluorescent tag, the at least one fluorescent tag being selected from the group consisting of fluoranthene, fluorescent clear blue dye, and mixtures thereof, and the at least one fluorescent tag being present in an amount of about 0.2 g in 5 g of the drum maintenance fluid; generating an energy source for stimulating an emission of fluorescent light from the fluorescent tagged drum maintenance fluid; stimulating the emission of fluorescent light from the fluorescent tagged drum maintenance fluid; measuring the emission of fluorescent light from the fluorescent tagged drum maintenance fluid at a predetermined wavelength; subjecting the stimulated emission of fluorescent light from the fluorescent tagged drum maintenance fluid to a filter to remove background interference before measuring the emission of fluorescent light from the fluorescent tagged drum maintenance fluid at the predetermined wavelength; and identifying a test drum maintenance fluid as authentic when the measured emission of fluorescent light from the test drum maintenance fluid meets a predetermined emission of fluorescent light from the fluorescent tagged drum maintenance fluid at the predetermined wavelength after filtering.