Labcyte, whose Echo® liquid handling platforms move liquids with sound , has announced the grant of its 40th US patent. Patent number 7,717,544 describes how in real time acoustic energy is optimized to transfer a droplet of any fluid, even those that are unknown.

Labcyte’s acoustic droplet ejection technology offers touchless transfer of a wide variety of fluids, with major benefits in life science applications including drug discovery, genomics, proteomics and diagnostics.

“This new feature-already incorporated in our products-allows customers to transfer liquids for a wide range of applications including siRNA screening, qPCR, genotyping and total assay assembly for drug discovery,” said Rich Ellson, Labcyte CTO.

“Customers have chosen Echo liquid handlers because they provide better precision and accuracy, reduce operating costs and eliminate cross-contamination. The technology described in the patent allows users to transfer many different fluids with factory-installed calibrations that require no user customization. By delivering precisely the amount of acoustic energy required the challenges faced by other liquid handling platforms, such as variable surface tension and viscosity, are eliminated. The built-in intelligence of the Echo platform automatically optimizes fluid transfer well by well.”