High-Throughput Blood-Fractionation System Is Fully Automated

A high-throughput blood-fractionation system extracts the buffy coat (white blood cells) from whole blood samples as well as separating plasma, serum, and erythrocytes. The innovative, upgradeable system provides a fully automated solution to blood fractionation and processing

Called the automated blood fractionation (ABF) system, it is a self-contained unit capable of processing up to 500 samples per day, providing substantial time and labor cost-savings compared with manual fractionation. In addition, the system eliminates human error, is more reproducible, and facilitates sample tracking and auditing. The unit is also available as a semi-automated system.

The ABF system incorporates vision system technology, which measures the height of each fraction and calculates the volume of each layer following fractionation via centrifugation. It also offers significant health and safety benefits by reducing employee exposure to unscreened blood, and a laboratory information management system (LIMS) interface that ensures ease of acquisition and manipulation of data.

Developed by RTS Life Science (Manchester, UK), the ABF system is planned for launch at the European Spring Biobanking and Biorepositories 2008, scheduled to take place on April 15-16, 2008, in Zurich, Switzerland. Kristian Spreckley, blood-fractionation product manager at RTS Life Science commented, "RTS has developed this new ABF system in response to the unique needs of the biobanking industry. The system should be installed to automate blood fractionation and buffy coat retrieval from whole blood in any high volume environment.”


Related Links:
RTS Life Science