Hi Dr.Michael,

Good Idea, But I am wondering whether could you take single cells in a eppendorf tube( just thought of expanding your example).

Researchers are interested mostly in single cell gene expression studies & imaging.

Currently, these are done through the use of microfluidics and companies like Fluidigm & Biotek have those facilities.

Any how, good luck with your idea & go ahead, other members of research gate may suggest more as I am a young student stage researcher

Sounds interesting. How do you discriminate between the cells you want to pick and those you don't want to pick? Can you pick the cells from a mixture of cells (e.g. during stem cell differentiation to pick out only cardiomyocytes)? And what is the advantage compared to the ClonePix from Genetix?

I hope this helps.

Thanks for your quick reply. The cells could be chosen via inverted microscope (morphology or fluorescent label) and then picked up gently and transferred into another container of desire. The cells can be picked up individually from a adherent culture (please see http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24270585 ). Compared to other technologies you could really pick up exactly your cell of interest. We are not biologist and can therefore not judge which is the most desired application in single cell biology and what containers/vials you use in your research.

Dear Michael Gabi,

We did a lot of single cell manipulations in the early 90's. This included microinjection of individual cells, extraction of organelles from individual cells and transfer to other (plant) cells, individual culture of selected cells in microdroplets, transfer of small microcalli to other droplets, microfusion of selected plant protoplasts etc. Are you trying to find applications for a technique you have been developing, or looking for techniques to use single cell manipulations?

Dear Harrie Verhoeven,

We are trying to find applications in Biology for our FluidFM technology. I would like to know therefore: what is your most needed single cell manipulation feature (pick&place, injection, transfection, local release of drugs etc....) that you can not or perform only in a laborious way with existing technologies.

Automated pick and place from a library stock of cells would be interesting for us. Dr. F.P. Wieringa TNO.

I am wondering if surface acoustic waves devices can be manipulated to do this specially some bonding methods to bond PDMS to them hadn't worked well.

Dear Dr. Fokko Wieringa, thank you for your comment. Could you explain your need a bit more in detail? As far as I understand you would like to be able to pick cells from a a library (e.g. myocytes) and place it into a certain position of another cell culture dish and then take another cell from another library (e.g. neuron) and place it next to it?

@Mukesh Gupta, thank you for the detailed information. b+c+i .) application seem to be the primary market for pick&place then. d+e) Injection seems also to be important, which we can also do with FluidFM directly without the need of holding the cell. f+g) the cells seem to be huge but i will check this market potential. The cells are large and I wonder if there is a need for a sophisticated tool if it can be done by micropipettes? Or would a tool with force control and automatization be helpful?

@Mukesh Gupta, Thanks a lot for this insight.

Hi everybody

How about cell sorter? is it useful to sort and seperate cells.

For aderent cells, Trypsin should be used before sorting.

I think yes when we need to do high quality cell cloning (to get a very homogenous clone of cell colony proliferate from one single cell.

we are using self made micro tools to pick up the cells during embryos microdissection& primary cell culture. Mouse pipette is too big. Nothing is available on the market.

Second application: pick up the clones under microscope that include hIPSCs; hESCs, primary explant culture. Automatic system for colonies pick up is available but it is very expensive.

@Olga Lakiza, do you do microdissection with Laser? What would be an acceptable price for a pick&place tool for you?