Automated Cell Smear Preparation With Cyclic Settling and Sealing
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing cell smear preparation and staining processes are labor-intensive, prone to human error, and lack full automation, leading to inefficiencies and high false negative rates due to interference factors like red blood cells and mucus, and require manual operations that increase labor costs and preparation time.
Innovation Solution
A full-automatic preparation method using a cyclic settling module for cell smear production, incorporating automatic sealing and laser labeling, which includes pretreatment to remove interfering substances, constant-temperature settling, and xylene-free polymer material sealing, ensuring high-throughput output and quality.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If manual smear preparation and staining is performed, then the process can be completed with simple equipment, but the false negative rate increases due to interference factors such as red blood cells, mucus, and impurities
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts and removes interference factors (red blood cells, mucus, impurities) from the cell sample through automated pretreatment processes before smear preparation, thereby improving diagnosis accuracy by eliminating substances that cause false negatives
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces an automated liquid-based cytology system as an intermediary between the raw cell sample and the final smear, using specialized solutions and automated processing to separate and eliminate interference factors while preserving diagnostic cells
2Productivity
If manual smear preparation and staining is performed, then the equipment complexity is low, but the preparation time is long and labor cost is high
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements an automated system that performs smear preparation, staining, and quality control without human intervention, allowing the system to serve itself in completing the entire diagnostic preparation process and significantly improving productivity
Solution Approach 2:
The patent replaces manual mechanical operations with automated mechanical and chemical systems, including automated pipetting, staining, and imaging equipment, thereby reducing labor costs and preparation time while managing device complexity through integration
3Manufacturing precision
If automated liquid-based cytology technology is used, then the smear quality is significantly improved with clear cell structure and background, but the cost of the whole process increases due to lack of full automation
Solution Approach 1:
The patent performs preliminary automated pretreatment of cell samples, including removal of interference factors and preparation of cells for staining, before the actual smear preparation process, thereby ensuring high smear quality while reducing the need for manual intervention and associated costs
Solution Approach 2:
The patent implements automated quality control and monitoring throughout the process, allowing for real-time detection and correction of issues, and enables recovery and reprocessing of samples that do not meet quality standards, thereby optimizing resource utilization and reducing overall process costs
4Extent of automation
If partial automation is implemented as in existing devices, then some manual operations are replaced, but cleaning, glass slide receiving and other processes still require manual operations increasing labor cost
Solution Approach 1:
The patent designs an automated system that performs multiple functions including sample processing, smear preparation, staining, quality control, and waste disposal within a single integrated platform, eliminating the need for separate manual operations and significantly reducing preparation time
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
Achieves automated smear preparation, staining, and sealing with reduced human error, enabling unattended high-throughput output and high-quality smear samples with improved traceability and safety.
Implementation Method 1
automatically transferring a pretreated cast-off cell obtained in S1 to a cyclic settling module to allow constant-temperature settling
Implementation Method 2
The polymer material is sprayed onto a surface of the cell layer, and then the polymer material is irradiated with UV light to perform curing
Data Source
AI summary
A full-automatic preparation method of a cast-off cell smear includes the following steps: S1: pretreatment of a cast-off cell: automatically pretreating the cast-off cell to be prepared to remove interfering substances; S2: automatically transferring a pretreated cast-off cell to a cyclic settling module to allow constant-temperature settling, and staining and moisturizing the pretreated cast-off cell; and S3: subjecting a moisturized cast-off cell to automatic liquid sealing. The full-automatic preparation method of the cast-off cell smear realizes the automation of smear preparation, staining, and sealing, and also realizes the unattended high-throughput output and the high-quality smear preparation and sealing.