Männedorf, Switzerland, 02 September 2003: Tecan, a leading player in the Life Sciences supply industry, today announced the launch of a new 384-channel pipetting head with liquid displacement technology that allows a broad range of high precision volume dispensing. Uniquely, the pipetting head features a liquid-filled system enabling superior precision, even at low volumes, as well as a new efficient washing system.

The 384-channel pipetting head allows fast, accurate and reliable sample dispensing of volumes from 200nl to 50µl. The lower compressibility of liquid compared to air offers significant improvements in pipetting precision. The fluid filled head therefore allows pipetting with outstanding precision over a wide range of volumes.

To minimize cross contamination during pipetting, a highly efficient washing process has been introduced that uses the system liquid and an active wash station. The system liquid is used to wash the inner surface of the pipetting needle while the outer surface is washed by the wash station. The result is a wash performance that meets the requirements of applications with the highest possible standards of purity.

Designed to offer the kind of flexibility that customers expect from Tecan solutions, the 384-channel head is compatible with both smaller and larger automated pipetting systems, including Tecan's bench top multi pipetting system, the Aquarius; the Te-MO family of multi-channel pipettors on Genesis and Freedom EVO; and larger automated systems using rail-based articulated robots (TRAC system).

"With the new 384-channel head Tecan introduces a high performance pipetting option that was designed for many applications in drug discovery, genomics and proteomics", comments Dr. Achim Wehren, Global Marketing Manager Biopharma.  "Whether for compound management and screening, PCR and SNP preparation, plate preparation, oligonucleotide processing, or MALDI target-plate spotting, the 384-channel head provides the ideal volume range, flexibility and precision to meet the specific needs of all these applications." 

For additional information, contact:

Product information:

Tecan Group Ltd.
Cornelia Kegele
Manager Marketing Communications and Branding
Tel.: +41 (0)44 922 81 11
Fax: +41 (0)44 922 82 81
e-mail: cornelia.kegele@tecan.com
Internet:www.tecan.com

Editorial contact:

Northbank Communications
Stefan Platz
Account Manager
Tel.: +49 (0)89 1895 7057
e-mail: s.platz@northbankcommunications.com