I-DOT - pneumatic high speed reformatting and pipetting technology

Due to the increasing number of assays and in order to save time and money, many laboratories show an increasing interest in a high grade of automation. At the same time a high flexibility is needed for the automated processes. Therefore, in the future, procedures and methods will be needed that cover a wide range of applications for as many different variants as possible. The developments in the field of modern biotechnology tend to use a minimum assay volumes while simultaneously increasing the assay diversity. E.g., protein and nucleic acid assays are used for high parallel testing. In recent years there was an apparent trend from 96 well plates to 384 and 1536 formats or the use of microarrays. Reasons for this were on the one hand the expensive reagents and disposables and therefore the chance for economizing of the screening process. On the other hand, there was the demand for a higher throughput. But currently still 95% of assays are executed in a volume range above 3 µl. Automated pipetting robots have gained acceptance for high-throughput applications. However, limitations are existing in the miniaturization of conventional pipetting. Today's solutions for liquid handling in nano and pico liter range are usually too weak to carry out a robust high throughput process. So the currently used liquid handling tools often does not meet the requirements.