The family of QPatch products consists of QPatch 16, with 16 parallel patch-clamp sites, QPatch HT with 48 parallel clamp sites, and the latest addition to the family, QPatch HTX, which contains the same amount of parallel measuement sites as QPatch HT, but with the additional possibility of measuring on several patched cells per site.
QPatch can be applied in all phases of ion channel drug discovery, including primary screening of focused compound libraries. The systems include individual, low-noise patch clamp amplifiers and pressure controllers for eac measurement site. Independent pressure control (i.e. suction on each cell individually) is important because each cell performs uniquely. Gigaseals are quickly obtained with some cells, while other cells form seals more slowly.
The QPatch HT has eight pipette, compared with QPatch 16, which comes with four. To optimize system performance further, an intelligent, forward-looking strategy for allocation of the pipettes to the acutal liquid application tasks has been implemented in the QPatch HT. Another unique feature of QPatch HT is the elevator unit for stacking and feeding compound plates and QPlates. Together with the cell preparation station, the elevator units ensure more than four hours of unattended operation. This means that the system can be put to work after normal working hours, thus enhancing daily throughput.
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