Integrated Cuvette Station for Rapid Analyte Testing
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current assay systems face challenges in performing reactions between samples and reagents in a streamlined, accurate, and rapid manner, particularly in preventing contamination and ensuring precise amounts, while also limiting simultaneous analysis of multiple samples and diagnoses.
Innovation Solution
A station with an integrated cuvette system that includes a housing, driving units for longitudinal and vertical movement, an optical reader, and a pump unit, allowing for precise sample and reagent handling, reaction, and detection, while accommodating multiple cuvettes and enabling simultaneous analysis with different fluorescence assays.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If samples and reagents are exposed to external environment during testing, then testing flexibility is improved, but contamination risk increases and accuracy deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The patent combines sample chambers, reagent chambers, and detection parts into an integrated cuvette system that moves as a single unit through the station. This merging allows the sample and reagent to be handled together in a controlled environment while maintaining testing flexibility, preventing contamination without sacrificing operational ease.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces a closed cuvette system as an intermediary between the sample/reagent and the external environment. The cuvette acts as a mediator that protects samples and reagents from contamination while allowing them to be processed through the station's mechanisms for mixing, reaction, and detection.
2Loss of time
If sequential testing is performed in a single integrated system, then analysis time and cost are reduced, but system complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent designs a multi-functional station that can perform sample loading, reagent addition, mixing, reaction, and detection within a single integrated system. The cuvette serves multiple functions (sample containment, reagent delivery, reaction vessel, and detection window), reducing the need for separate devices and minimizing analysis time while managing complexity through functional integration.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent enables continuous processing where the cuvette moves sequentially through different functional zones (sample chamber, reagent chamber, detection part) without interruption. The automated movement and processing steps ensure continuous useful action, eliminating idle time between operations and reducing overall analysis time.
3Productivity
If multiple diagnostic kits are tested simultaneously, then productivity increases, but device complexity and contamination control difficulty increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent divides the testing capacity into multiple parallel cuvette positions within the station, allowing multiple diagnostic kits to be processed simultaneously at different locations. This segmentation enables parallel processing of multiple samples while maintaining individual control over each test, increasing productivity without excessive complexity.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent employs dynamic positioning mechanisms that can move individual cuvettes or groups of cuvettes to different functional zones as needed. This dynamic capability allows flexible configuration of multiple tests simultaneously while adapting to different testing scenarios, improving throughput without fixed complex infrastructure.
4Manufacturing precision
If precise control over sample and reagent handling is implemented, then manufacturing precision and accuracy are improved, but device complexity and operation difficulty increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent designs the cuvette and station system to automatically control sample and reagent handling through integrated mechanisms. The system self-regulates the precise amounts of sample and reagent that mix and react within the cuvette, eliminating the need for complex external control systems while maintaining high precision in amount control.
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
The system enhances analysis accuracy and reproducibility, reduces analysis time and costs, and allows for simultaneous multiple diagnoses and analyses, while maintaining contamination prevention and precise control over sample and reagent handling.
Implementation Method 1
the cuvette comprises a sample collection member standby chamber in which a sample collection member is placed, a sample chamber, a reagent chamber, and a detection part
Data Source
Figure 1A
Figure 1B
Figure 2A
AI summary
The technical objective of the present disclosure is to provide a station, for testing an analyte in a sample, enabling accurate and quick reaction and analysis of the sample and a reagent in one apparatus. To this end, the present disclosure provides a station, which is for testing a sample by means of inserting a cuvette, having a standby chamber on which a collecting member is placed, a sample chamber, a reagent chamber and a detection unit. The station comprises: a housing which has an input/output part into which a cuvette is inserted; a driving unit which is provided inside the housing, horizontally moves the cuvette, vertically moves a collecting member, reacts a sample in a sample chamber and a reagent in a reagent chamber, and injects a reaction result thereof into a detection unit; and an optical reader which is provided on the horizontal movement path of the cuvette and is for analyzing the reaction result.