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News Release from: TTP LabTech | Subject: Mosquito
Edited by the Laboratorytalk Editorial
Team on 17 May 2007
New approach to hanging drop automation
is unique
Mosquito automates hanging drop plate set-up by aliquoting protein solution from a single source column to all 96 adhesive-free 'windows' on a hanging drop plate seal
TTP LabTech says its Mosquito has a unique approach to automating hanging drop protein crystallography set-ups This increases the chance of scale-up success as it allows the same technique to be used for both screening and scale-up, which is particularly beneficial for membrane protein crystallographers
This article was originally published on Laboratorytalk on 3 Oct 2002 at 8.00am (UK)
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It is one of the key reasons Mosquito has become the first choice for protein crystallographers along with its accurate positioning, ability to miniaturise crystallography set-ups (with drop volumes of only 50nl to 1200nl) and disposable pipettes which guarantee zero-cross contamination of samples.
Because mosquito pipettes in columns, it is able to take a column of droplets of solutions from the reservoir plate and place these directly on top of the protein drops to form a mirror image of the reservoir plate.
The seal containing the mirror image drops is then inverted over the reservoir plate - so each combined droplet of protein and screen hangs over its corresponding well of reservoir solution.
Further reading
Picking hits at nanolitre scale
By offering precision sampling of individual wells, researchers can quickly select hits from primary screening plates and transfer them directly to the next screening stage without further dilution
Work your Mosquito smarter
New functionality improves serial dilution set-up for screeners, automates new applications for protein crystallographers and enhances the new Mosquito X1 hit-picking system
Complete set-up takes under two minutes and it does not require a wash step or the creation of a duplicate source plate.
Automating drop set-up allows the researcher to screen more conditions using less sample in a shorter time, with the added advantages of improved accuracy and repeatability.
Mosquito's precise linear drives and optical sensors achieve positional accuracy better than 0.05mm in the X, Y and Z axes.
This, along with the tightly toleranced and relatively short pipette tips, means that drops are placed with a high degree of accuracy on the flat surface of the plate seal, which gives excellent optical properties for both manual and automated imaging.
Smaller drops can be used without the worry of protein and screen drops not coinciding.
This accuracy also means mosquito can create several multi-component drops per well, even in high-density 96-well hanging drop set-ups.
This allows up to 288 drop conditions to be created per plate.
Multi-aspirate protocols also enable mosquito to simply automate additive and seeding set-ups.
For protein crystallographers, the 'aspirate, aspirate, dispense' capability allows a combination of solutions to be dispensed simultaneously - with additional mixing if required - resulting in perfect drop formation, rapid liquid diffusion and no protein evaporation.
Mosquito applies this same accuracy and speed to setting up sitting drop or microbatch screens - without requiring reconfiguration or changes to the instrument head.
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