Problems encountered in automating sample preparation

Despite the progress, sample preparation continues to be the bottleneck of the analytical process as, only in the past 10-15 years, has its automation been actively addressed — by contrast, advances in automated chromatographic and spectroscopic equipment started one or two decades before. The reasons why SP remains the bottleneck of the analytical process vary among experts [7], but the most widely endorsed are as follows  

All these constraints have restricted the development of automated sample preparation devices. 

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