Laboratory automation - development of an innovative bench top device for automatic preparation of liquid nutrition media

For the production of bioactive agents and ingredients of plants for the pharmaceutical, cosmetic and food industry, specific target plant cell and tissue cultures move into the focus of interest. To increase the yield of the target metabolites of the culture, extensive series of experiments are necessary. This includes in particular the optimization of the composition of the fluid nutrition medium.
Hence, the demand for standardized processes for the efficient preparation of the experiments increases significantly. Initiating forces are the pharma, cosmetic and food industry as well as research institutions, which are developing highly productive plant in vitro cell and tissue cultures. Currently, a freezing preservation of such plant cell and tissue cultures exists in an experimental state only. Therefore, sub-cultivation needs to be done in a 14 or 21 day cycles. The sub-cultivation increases the consumption of fluid nutrition medium and keeps the laboratory staff occupied. Generally a high scaled production of nutrition medium is available in an automated process already. But the ability to order consumer specific produced nutrition media is limited by several factors like

the composition is too complex,
the ordered amount is too small,
the degeneration starts right after production.

schematic view of NutriJet — NutriJet device design concept (1) scale; (2) magnetic stirrer; (3) recipe control (touch panel); (4) container 1 (powdery); (5) container 2 (liquid); (6) container 3 (powdery); (7) container 4 (liquid); (8) thermal printer; (9) device for automated cleaning; (10) monitoring container; (11) port for dH2O

Due to the degeneration, the production of the nutrition media is located in the laboratory on site. Normally, the nutrition medium is scaled in a capacity of under 10 liters. For the reproducibility of the experimental data, the weighing needs to be noted. Out of this situation, the partners of the project came to the decision to develop an innovative fully automated laboratory device for small scale fluid nutrition medium production.