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The Integra Viaflo 96 was used by German virus and prion validation group at Octapharma to help reduce the time taken to undertake PCR assays by more than 60%.
Octapharma specialises in the development and manufacture of preparations from human plasma.
The virus and prion group was set-up for small scale production of plasma-based drugs from human blood, which must be tested to be free of contaminating viruses.
Its virology PCR assay involves fixing a PCR template on the well surface of 96-well plates and then undertaking a protocol that includes three washing steps.
To undertake their PCR assay more efficiently, Octapharma sought a system that enabled reproducible and accurate liquid handling in the 96-well format and was able to completely remove residual liquid as well as avoid well-to-well contamination.
Andreas Volk, a research scientist at Octapharma, said: “Initially we looked at liquid handling robots with automatic washing stations to undertake our PCR assay. Not only was this a costly solution but we found wash stations to be prone to cross contamination.
“When we tested the VIAFLO 96 it enabled medium throughput liquid handling with all the adjustment options we had been used to with manual pipettes, plus a specified tip immersion depth for each pipetting step. With our PCR protocol, which involves ten full liquid transfers per plate, we now only use half the amount of pipette tips as we can use the same tips for liquid handling and again for aspiration in each washing step.
“Octapharma staff has found using the VIAFLO 96 highly intuitive and overall the time required for our PCR procedures has been reduced to approximately one third of the original time.”
The VIAFLO 96 is a handheld 96-channel electronic pipette which has been designed to handle like a standard handheld pipette.
Fast replication or reformatting of 96 and 384 well plates and high precision transferring of reagents, compounds and solutions to or from microplates with the VIAFLO 96 is as easy as pipetting with a standard electronic pipette into a single tube.
Four interchangeable pipetting heads with pipetting volumes up to 12.5 µl, 125 µl, 300 µl or 1250 µl are available for the VIAFLO 96.
For 384-well pipetting, there is the VIAFLO 384, featuring 384-channel pipetting heads in the volume range of 12.5 µl and 125 µl. It is also compatible with 96-channel pipetting heads.
