High-throughput screening in 96-well-plates

Efforts to keep the time from the development of a product until its introduction – also known as time-to-market – as short as possible also do not stop in pharmaceutical research. Efficiency applies to each process step as well as for basic research. To be able to conduct efficient high-throughput screening, it is of great benefit to be able to cultivate many parallel batches in very little space.

To achieve maximum oxygenation and optimal mixing even in small culture vessels, a small shaking throw adapted to this in combination with a high agitation speed up to 1000 min-1 is required. At the same time, less liquid volume is needed which decreases the costs for culture medium.

To utilize the limited laboratory space as efficiently as possible for screening applications, several incubation shakers stacked on top of one another are used. Devices which are particularly space-saving have doors which open downwards and require little additional space for the connection, ventilation and maintenance.

Efficient screening can only succeed if the cultivation conditions are right. These include temperature uniformity, precise CO2 regulation and cooling as well as condensate-free humidification. This prevents loss of liquid through evaporation which is why it is indispensable, particularly in the case of the small volumes of microtiter and deep-well plates. In the screening of cell cultures, it is also recommended to consider the hygienic design of the incubation shaker, such as an antimicrobial surface. Thus for example, an antimicrobial surface can prevent contamination..

The cultivation in microtiter plates offers the option of preparing them automatically with the aid of liquid-handling robots and then evaluating them afterwards with the help of microtiter plate readers. As a result, time, manual labor, and thus also costs can be saved.