Liquid Delivery Eye-Openers at SLAS

Challenges in pipetting complex liquids

WESTBROOK, Maine (February 18, 2022) – It was a pleasure for many to attend last week’s first in-person SLAS conference and exhibition in two years. Being able to interact and collaborate with peers in the fast-evolving environment of laboratory automation makes such gatherings incredibly valuable.

Artel welcomed the opportunity to assist laboratorians at the show who are faced with the challenges of working with small volumes of complex liquids in their assays. Scientists could see for themselves in real time the effects that tweaking pipetting technique and liquid class optimization had on data. Several attendees were quite surprised to see the non-trivial variations that occurred when using the same technique on different liquid types and it underlined the difficulties inherent in trying to automate these workflows accurately.

The Pipetting Challenge continued to be an enjoyable and educational experience for all. One individual attending the show who had no laboratory background at all was able to win a gold medal for pipetting excellence after a short coaching session – demonstrating the benefits of having no bad habits.  Another participant was surprised to see the impact a single change to their technique had on accuracy. The overall winner of the event was Ricardo Noyola Lozano from Thermo Fisher Scientific, with a relative inaccuracy of 0.02% and a CV of 3.93%. Congratulations!