Screening robotic

Figure 2.17. Images of typical turnkey automated screening robots that use an articulated arm to move plates around the screening system. The robot is placing plates into two different liquid handling devices. Top left is a PlateMate Plus and top right is a Multidrop. This system was built internally by Bristol Myers Squibb engineers.

If small or medium libraries for lead optimization are demanded and all synthetic products are to be screened individually, most often parallel synthesis is the method of choice. Parallel syntheses can be conducted in solution, on solid phase, with polymer-assisted solution phase syntheses or with a combination of several of these methods. Preferably, parallel syntheses are automated, either employing integrated synthesis robots or by automation of single steps such as washing, isolation, or identification. The latter concept often allows a more flexible and less expensive automation of parallel synthesis. 

A regularly formed crystal of reasonable size (typically >500 pm in each dimension) is required for X-ray diffraction. Samples of pure protein are screened against a matrix of buffers, additives, or precipitants for conditions under which they form crystals. This can require many thousands of trials and has benefited from increased automation over the past five years. Most large crystallographic laboratories now have robotics systems, and the most sophisticated also automate the visualization of the crystallization experiments, to monitor the appearance of crystalline material. Such developments [e.g., Ref. 1] are adding computer visualization and pattern recognition to the informatics requirements. 

Saunders, K. Automation and robotics in ADME screening. Drug Discov. Today Technol. 2004, 1, 373-380. 

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