Opentrons’ latest feat brings lab automation to everyone’s workbench This article is brought to you by our sponsor Opentrons “Lean biotech startups are now possible.” Vinod Khosla on Opentrons lab robot OT-2 So said. As the most well-known figure in green tech investing in Silicon Valley, he probably knows what he's talking about. Khosla and other ambitious biotech investors are betting that Opentrons will bring affordable lab automation to all biologists for the first time ever. OT-2 is the product of $10 million in seed funding to make personal lab robots a reality.
“Three-quarters of our customers have never owned a lab robot before,” said Will Canine, Opentrons co-founder and chief product officer. This is interesting given that Opentrons already has a sizable user base. Seven of the ten largest pharmaceutical companies are running their first-generation robots, as are most of the top biological research universities. With the latest version of its product ($4,000), anyone with a PC can easily design and run complex automation protocols in the lab. "The OT-2 is the 'Apple II' moment for laboratory automation," Canine said. "One individual OT-2's designers specifically wanted to reduce or completely eliminate the computer programming typically required by today's mainframe-oriented solutions. The robot is equipped with Opentrons' new no-code protocol designer is an intuitive visual design program that allows biologists to easily create and customize OT-2 protocols without writing code.
"We want to provide researchers with the same user experience as on consumer devices like smartphones," Canine said. In Opentrons' OT-2 promotional video, a lab researcher clicks on her laptop and creates an intuitive-to-use, New experimental designs for visually descriptive icons.
While there's excitement around cloud labs and foundries today, Canine and the Opentrons team see cloud labs as an incremental addition to the trend toward lab centralization that's been going on since the dawn of biotech. “It’s basically adding a software layer on top of traditional CRO,” Canine said, “and it’s already very automated.
He hopes that Opentron can be part of the drive to lower the cost of laboratory automation so that centralized foundries can lower prices and make their services more accessible. “Instead of continuing the trend toward centralization, we should reverse it — decentralize, "Opentrons are proving that open and affordable hardware can also be the best in terms of performance and engineering," said Drew Endy, Canine Professor of Bioengineering at Stanford University. ” His lab was an early adopter and beta tester of OT-2.
"To us, OT-2 means that anyone who can afford a laptop can set up an open biofoundry." Opentrons' roots can be traced back to the Brooklyn community biohacker space Genspace. While working there, Canine met his co-founder Chiu Chau on the DIY bio listserv. They soon formed Opentrons and have been focusing on grassroots, “bottom-up” biotech empowerment ever since. "Biotechnology can solve some of the world's biggest problems - it may be the only technology out there that can truly save the world. But not enough people have access to the tools they need to use it. That's what we want to change.
"In addition to the cost savings, this little robot comes with a library of proven protocols developed by hundreds of scientists from across the scientific community. The open API allows users to customize the robot to their needs. It can work with microscopy, computer vision , and even Amazon Alexa integration.
“We heard a lot from our customers about the needs of biologists, which is why we developed the OT-2 that is affordable, easy to use and reliable,” Canine said. He hopes the OT-2 will not only make scientists' lives easier, but also accelerate scientific discovery. This is a great idea for a little robot. Will Canine will speak at the SynBioBeta 2018 Global Synthetic Biology Summit in San Francisco, October 1-3 (part of Synthetic Biology Week).
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