Amid the widespread outbreak of the COVID-19 caused by SARS-CoV-2, the development of test methods that can efficiently and precisely identify positive carriers is cited as one of the most important approaches to curbing the pandemic, other than the development of vaccines and medications. Among the known methods for testing virus, the qPCR test is used most widely, while a new method developed by Israeli researchers at Technion University, which is based on qPCR and pool testing and can test a batch of pooled samples at once for high volume screening, is gaining popularity among laboratories for COVID-19 testing. However, these methods involve skillful operations and tedious processes that could pose a serious challenge to lab staff.
The EzMate Automated Pipetting System by Blue-Ray Biotech is designed to simplify the pipetting process and eliminate errors resulting from manual operations. When used for sample preparations in a conventional qPCR practice, the EzMate, as compatible with most consumables in the lab supplies market, can seamlessly fit into the process and automatically take samples from a nucleic acid extraction system and implement pre-PCR processing before loading the plate onto the qPCR machine. No replacement of consumables is needed in the process, thus decreasing the potential of cross contamination and speeding up sample preparations.
In addition, when a pooling method is applied in qPCR testing, the EzMate can also be used in sample preparations to provide automated pipetting in place of traditional manual practices, so as to streamline sample preparation workflow, avoid errors and improve test throughput.
To learn more about how the EzMate Automated Pipetting System can be applied in the practices of qPCR testing with/without pooling samples for COVID-19 screening, please read this application note.
