Date: 14 December 2011 19:13
Dear CCP4ers,
We are currently fighting with our crystallization robot and would be happy
to find out if anyone else has experienced similar problems - and hopefully
found a solution.
To make a long and extremely frustrating story with our robot short:
We are running an ArtRobbins 4-Channel Phoenix in our xtal-facility. It is
equipped with the "new" nano-dispensers and TC-needles which are probably
also present in the Cobra or Gryphon instruments.
Our problem is that almost every two days we have serious trouble with the
nano-dispensing needles, which either become leaky or completely clogged. We
do not even heavily use our Phoenix or use membrane proteins in detergents -
in average we are dispensing less than 5-10plates of usually nice behaving
proteins per day. The same proteins dispensed with the "old" needle systems
(in the neighboring MPI facility) are not causing any problems at all.
I am not really sure how to avoid these problems or how to deal with it. We
do almost everything with our samples to remove aggregates (sample
centrifuged 10min@13k rpm, supernatant filtered again through filter units).
I am happy to receive any comments or hints regarding the Phoenix (or
Cobra/Gryphon if the nanodispensers are the same type) or any additional
comment e.g. on how you prepare samples in your lab.
I would be grateful if anyone with ideas or suggestions could write to me
off-list, I will post a summary if we can solve the problems.
Thanks and regards from munich,
Gregor
---
Dr. Gregor Witte
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