Technology

comPOUND offers flexible storage capacity with high speed cherry-picking to select library subsets. It is capable of identifying and delivering any sample in a minimum of 5 seconds. When modules are linked together, samples can be accessed from all modules simultaneously. This maximises sample throughput so processing speeds increase as your library grows.

comPOUND does not use robotic arms but instead stores and retrieves each requested sample using air pressure. This minimises the number of moving parts in the store’s chilled environment, greatly increasing reliability. This innovative use of pneumatics also means that samples can be delivered up to 15m away from comPOUND, so that samples can be delivered to the laboratory, while the store is housed elsewhere.

Inside the cabinet, the microtubes are held in 26 carousels, kept in a self-contained, controlled environment. These carousels provide extremely high density storage and give comPOUND a very compact footprint of only 1.2m x 1.65m x 2.4m. Sample integrity is maintained using a hermetically sealed storage chamber with an inert nitrogen atmosphere kept at -20°C. Individual samples are selected and tracked in and out of the store using a 2D barcode on each microtube. By cherry-picking only the sample requested, comPOUND avoids unnecessary freeze-thaw cycles.

The basic comPOUND storage module holds up to 100,000 samples in 1.4mL microtubes. A double-density module – the comPOUND D2 – can store up to 200,000 0.5mL microtubes, or a mixture of both tube types.

As each comPOUND module is self-contained, it can be sited anywhere and relocated easily if your laboratory processes change. This modularity and the unit's small footprint mean that the comPOUND system can expand with a business, starting from small laboratory scale requirements of one module, up to an integrated library of almost any size.