Artel Enhances MVS® for Faster, Standardized Performance Verification of Automated Liquid Handlers

Artel announces several significant enhancements to the MVS® (Multichannel Verification System), that provide additional capabilities for understanding the performance of automated liquid handlers. The Artel MVS now generates measurements traceable to national and international standards of volumes dispensed to each well in a 384-well plate. Based on ratiometric photometry, which measures light absorption by two specially formulated dyes to verify delivered volumes, the Artel MVS is well-known for its effectiveness and has become the industry standard for liquid handling quality assurance.

Standardization, improved data management, and speed are at the core of the latest MVS enhancements. With the MVS update, users of 96- or 384-well plates will be able to compare liquid handler performance from site-to-site and from instrument-to-instrument.

“Whether you are working in drug discovery, biopharmaceutical QC, clinical diagnostics, forensic analysis or any other demanding field, you need assurance that the liquid handlers used for your processes are all performing to a common, dependable standard,” said Keith Albert, Technical Marketing Manager for Artel. “Dispensing and measuring one microliter at your lab in Boston should be the same as dispensing and measuring one microliter at your lab in Los Angeles.”

For easier data management, the Artel MVS can now evaluate 16- and 24-channel pipettors, as well as pipettors with 1, 2, 4, 8, 12, 96, and 384 channels. In addition, users of 8-channel dispensers can now employ the Artel MVS to perform accurate volume readings with additional dispense pattern options, so that their verification processes mimic actual operations.

Busy laboratories will also benefit from the increased speed of the Artel MVS without sacrificing accuracy and precision. Now equipped with an 8-channel plate reader, the Artel MVS can read a 384-well microtiter plate four times faster than before, in just one minute. The Artel PowerWave®*, a monochromator-based plate reader, can be used at a wide range of wavelengths, allowing it to operate with multiple applications in the lab.

The latest enhancements to the Artel MVS also include changes to the system’s calibrator plate for more robust calibration of the MVS. The new design allows for more measurements per cuvette in Data Manager version 2.4 and higher, resulting in a more accurate calibration of the plate reader. In addition, easier to clean cuvette surfaces ensure that day-to-day performance variations in plate reader performance are normalized.

Existing MVS customers will receive updates to Data Manager, the MVS system software, at no charge.

“The developments in liquid handling and laboratory science overall are exciting. At Artel, our goal is to ensure that as liquid handling instrumentation advances, laboratories have at their disposal quality assurance tools that provide a comprehensive assessment of equipment performance,” said Kirby Pilcher, President, Artel. “The increasing popularity of 384-well plates and the lack of a standardized, easy-to-use performance assessment method were the drivers behind our latest MVS enhancements.”

*PowerWave is a registered trademark of BioTek Instruments, Winooski, VT.