Journal
REVIEW OF SCIENTIFIC INSTRUMENTS
Volume 87, Issue 11, Pages -Publisher
AMER INST PHYSICS
DOI: 10.1063/1.4966989
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Funding
- Div Of Civil, Mechanical, & Manufact Inn
- Directorate For Engineering [1346638] Funding Source: National Science Foundation
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The handheld micropipette is the most ubiquitous instrument for precision handling of microliter-milliliter liquid volumes, which is an essential capability in biology and chemistry laboratories. The range of one pipette is typically adjustable up to 10-fold its minimum volume, requiring the use and maintenance of multiple pipettes for liquid handling across larger ranges. Here we propose a design for a single handheld pipette adjustable from 0.1 mu l to 1000 mu l (i.e., 10(4)-fold) which spans the range of an entire suite of current commercial pipettes. This is accomplished by placing an elastic diaphragm between the existing pipette body and tip, thereby de-amplifying its native volume range while maintaining its simple manual operating procedure. For proof-of-concept, we adapted a commercial pipette (100-1000 mu l nominal range) with a selection of rubber sheets to function as the diaphragms and confirmed the accuracy and precision of drawn volumes are within international ISO-8655 standards across the entire 10(4)-fold volume range. The presence of the diaphragms introduces a nonlinear mechanical behavior and a time-dependency due to heat transfer, however, by model and experiment, these are redressed so as to maintain the pipette's accuracy and precision. Published by AIP Publishing.
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