INTEGRATED NANO-VOLUME AUTOMATED GENOMIC WORKSTATION

尽管30亿个碱基对的人类基因组的完整测序预计只需要几年时间，但它的成本很高。为了显着降低大规模DNA测序的成本和时间，减少昂贵的试剂的使用和样本处理的劳动量是很重要的。我们建议将DNA测序所需的样本大小从常规要求的大小减少约两个数量级(从5-10微升减少到50-100纳升)。这将通过在纳米移液器系统中执行DNA样本的所有混合和反应来实现。将纳米移液器的概念集成到以前开发的改进型自动化工作站原型中，将允许将非常小规模的样品自动测序快速纳入生产操作。

Although the complete sequencing of the 3 billion base-pair human genome is expected to be only a few years away, it is coming at a cost premium. In order to significantly reduce the cost and time of large-scale DNA sequencing it is important to reduce the usage of expensive reagent and the amount of sample handling labor. We propose to reduce the size of samples required for DNA sequencing by approximately two orders of magnitude from what is conventionally required (from 5-10 microliters to 50-100 nanoliters). This will be accomplished by performing all mixing and reactions of DNA samples within a nano-pipetter system. Integrating the nano-pipetter concept into a modified, previously developed automated workstation prototype will allow the rapid incorporation of very small scale sample automated sequencing into production operations.