Dynex Agility Automated ELISA System, Operator'S Manual

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Chapter 3 System Design
34 Agility System
Operator’s Manual
3.7 Consumable Drawers
The system has five user removable drawers that are capable of holding four consumable
racks. The drawers are on the right side of the instrument and slide out. A typical drawer is
shown in Figure 3-6.
Figure 3-6: Consumable Drawer
The consumable drawers are capable of holding sample tip holders that hold 112 tips, deep
well strip holders capable of holding 12 deep well strips and a reagent mixing vessel holder
which is capable of holding 18 mixing vessels. The contents of each drawer position are
determined by a two-dimensional barcode read of the holder in each position.
The user must load the drawers with new consumables. Upon loading a drawer the drawer is
detected as being inserted (sensor at rear) and the system schedules a read of the drawer
consumable packs to determine what the drawer contains. The read is performed by the
camera on the telescopic arm. Prior to performing the read the arm will have activated the
locking mechanism to secure the drawer. Locking the drawer in place maintains secure
custody of the contents of the drawer for usage tracking of consumables and instrument status.
Once all consumable items on a drawer have been used, the drawer is unlocked and the status
light changed to a pulsing blue so that the user may reload further drawer items. To aid the
user as to what to load when additional consumables are required, the system will schedule a
load wizard window for the operator to perform, rearranging drawer items to make a used
drawer available if necessary.
Each consumable drawer has an indicator light for the user to determine the status of the
individual drawer. The status light indicates that the drawer is locked and is in use or that the
contents of the drawer have been exhausted and the user is free to remove a drawer to reload
more consumables.
The system tracks the status of the loaded, unused consumables to determine if there are
sufficient available consumables to run pending worklists. A status screen is available to see
the amount of each loaded consumables type and also show if there is sufficient inventory to
perform any pending or potential worklist jobs. The system will schedule load wizard
windows to notify the user which additional consumables are required and where additional
consumable items should be loaded for optimal operation.