Industry News: Providing solutions for liquid handling challenges at SLAS2020

Artel presented two tutorials and one short course at the recent Society for Lab Automation and Screening (SLAS) show in San Diego, California, with the objective of helping scientists meet the challenges that liquid handling presents in their laboratories.

The first tutorial focused on how to choose the appropriate liquid handler for specific assays and applications.  The presentation entitled, Choosing the Right Liquid Handler and Verifying its Performance, was delivered by Jason Graves.  Jason has been automating assays and supporting screening groups for over 20 years with companies such as Pfizer, Merck, Novo Nordisk and Eurofins Scientific. Jason most recently joined the Artel team to help customers solve their liquid handling challenges.  

The second presentation, The Key to Successfully Automating Your NGS Workflows, detailed the multitude of considerations involved in optimizing processes for automation.  Dr. Nathaniel Hentz partnered with Tecan, a leading provider of laboratory automation solutions, to describe how labs can increase throughput, lower costs and improve reproducibility for their assay workflows.  

This was also the sixth consecutive year that SLAS and Artel have partnered to present the popular Liquid Handling Essentials Short Course for new or beginning users of liquid handling devices. One attendee commented, “This is the most relevant Short Course I’ve taken, and I have been attending Short Courses for over 10 years!” 

Liquid Handling Essentials was offered twice during SLAS to accommodate the demand, demonstrating the increasing prevalence of automation and complexity of assays in laboratories of all sizes. The student-instructor engagement and the opportunity to discuss issues such as liquid class optimization was particularly well received.  

“The interactions with the attendees during the hands-on sessions and afterward with the Q&A were especially rewarding for me as an instructor.  We received a wide variety of specific questions about liquid handling challenges, and had value-added discussions on best practice solutions”, said Kaziya Lee, Application Specialist.  “We are looking forward to a reprise of the Short Course next year.”

Want more of the latest science news straight to your inbox? Become a SelectScience member for free today>>