Coated Blade Spray (CBS) is a microextraction technology for chemical analysis.  The first stages of the workflow involve conventional liquid handling and sample collection using the coated blade in a vertical position.  During analysis, the blade is then positioned horizontally in front of a mass spectrometer (MS).  

Restek’s challenge involves providing an automated workflow whereby the liquid handling and vertically oriented sample extraction stages are seamlessly integrated to the horizontally oriented analysis stage.  

An Opentrons OT-2 with two single-channel pipettors was used to couple these stages. Reorienting the blade device horizontally was accomplished by heavily modifying one of the pipettors.  The Opentrons API was also extended to integrate communication and peripheral control required for MS data collection.

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• Coated blade spray as a new technique for high throughput chemical analysis
• Moving your robot from the prep bench to the analysis bench
• Our design approaches to build custom automation tools from commercially available devices

Who should watch:

Anyone looking to buy an OT-2 for NGS library prep, new users of the OT-2, long time user of the OT-2 looking to switch their application to NGS library prep

• Users of high throughput screening workflows

• Group Leaders or Research Directors

• Medical & academic researchers

• Automation specialists

• Bioanalytical engineers

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Tracey Peters

Senior Scientist,

Restek Corporation

Tracey has over 40 years in leadership positions with a focus on leveraging technology to create elegant, robust solutions.  He has extensive industrial experience in ultrasound imaging medical devices.  At Restek his contributions span 12 years in product and process designs for a wide array of analytical chemistry products.  On the Coated Blade Spray (CBS) program, Tracey is the chief developer of novel mechanical systems enabling seamless integration from sample preparation with the Opentrons OT-2 to mass spectrometry analysis.  Tracey received his BS in Mechanical Engineering from The University of Pittsburgh.

Shane Stevens

Developmental Scientist,

Restek Corporation

Shane has over 15 years in product and systems development at Restek.  His primary contributions have been lab design and scale up for in-house silica particle manufacturing and developing chromatography and sample preparation products.  For the past 4 years Shane has focused on CBS manufacturing systems, applications, workflows, and infrastructure for automated sample analysis.  He is the primary designer for electronics and software integrating the OT-2 into the complete CBS system. Shane received his BS in Chemistry from The Pennsylvania State University.

Originally Aired 05/17/23