iChemCabinet - Development and test of an universal, interactive, intelligent laboratory cabinet for handling and dispensing of chemicals from containers with screw caps
Innovative production systems in the field of biotechnology for a sustainable production of active agents and ingredients for the food-, pharmaceutical- and cosmetics-industry rely on a controlled, traceable supply of single chemicals for development- and production-processes.
The storage of the needed chemicals as powders, liquids or solutions takes place in an unclear chemical cabinet e.g. in the respective R&D laboratory. Preparation tasks for buffer- or nutrient medium fabrication are therefore often faulty concerning the chemicals used as well as their concentrations and amounts. Contaminations happen often and the documentation hallmarks error-prone manual tasks. Additionally the best before date of the chemicals is passed often or the supply is low when actually needed. Consequentially a time-delay occures when chemicals have to be re-ordered.
In laboratories of nearly every size but especially with small and middle-sized laboratories there is a growing demand for automated solutions for recurrent, standardized tasks connected with an automated documentation (GMP-compliant) to - on the one hand - process more samples (throughput increase) and - on the other hand - raise efficiency and accuracy as well as to cut cost.
![iChemCabinet design](https://tu-dresden.de/ing/maschinenwesen/int/ressourcen/bilder/bioverfahrenstechnik/bt_projekte/iChemCabinet_design.png/@@images/fbf5dbc5-8433-4658-94ba-d0242ef8eb67.png)
Design study for an automated chemical cabinet with integrated de-capping-station and a dispensing-module.
With a precise technical automation solution for controlled, traceable and timely administration and withdrawal of powders and liquids from a chemical cabinet this demand in the field of experimental preparations can be met. The new device will be an innovative, interactive and cross-linked chemical cabinet that acts as a cyber-physical system (CPS) which does an automated administration of containers with chemicals, locates their current position (sub-project of nevoLAB GmBH) and is capable to dispense powders and liquids with high accuracy after specific user requests from each container (sub-project of TU Dresden, Bioprocess Engineering).
Project funding:
Central Innovation Programme of the Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology (BMWi) through the innovation network "SmartLAB - Intelligent Lab of the Future"
project number: 16KN063727
Project head:
![Portraitfoto Dr.-Ing. Felix Lenk](https://tu-dresden.de/ing/maschinenwesen/int/ressourcen/bilder/bioverfahrenstechnik/foto_ma/FLenk/@@images/95fa2cb2-d503-48b3-b01f-122afd51b651.jpeg)
Project researcher
NameDr.-Ing. Felix Lenk
Head of SmartLab-systems
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Project staff:
![Portrait of Christoph Otto](https://tu-dresden.de/ing/maschinenwesen/int/ressourcen/bilder/bioverfahrenstechnik/foto_ma/ottochr/@@images/16fed3c5-0196-4b80-b8cb-53a8d8f509c2.png)
Project researcher
NameDipl.-Ing. Christoph Otto
SmartLab-systems, lab automation
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Cooperation partner:
nevoLAB GmbH
Manfred Lorenz
http://www.nevolab.de
Project term:
01.01.2018 - 31.12.2019