Image credit: Nanographene oxide interacting with bacteria, TEM. Wellcome Collection. Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0).
MOTHER MACHINE PACK
No interference on your microscope focus
Use the reservoir of your choice
Keep it inside your microscope incubator chamber
Mother machine pack setup
Closely follow the development of your long-term mother machine experiment on top of the microscope stage while constantly refreshing the media. Our mother machine pack consists of a vibration-free compact pump that doesn’t require an air compressor and is already integrated with a flow sensor. The microfluidic device can be homemade or bought from a commercial supplier.
The mother machine pack contains:
- Perfusion pump for microscope: the pump comes with a motherbox and a pressure unit with a flow sensor, but extra units can be added if needed.
- Reservoirs: any volume reservoir can be plugged into the system.
- Microfluidic chip: use the chip you choose, homemade or commercially available.
Compatibility
The mother machine pack is not limited by your chip design or manufacturer and can be used with the microfluidic device of your choice.
Chips
- Homemade devices, PDMS, PMMA, etc.
- Ibidi
- Microfluidic ChipShop
- Synvivo
- etc
Other equipment
- Microscope Incubation chambers
- Stage top incubators
- CO2 incubators
Reservoirs
The perfusion pump can be connected to any reservoir, from Eppendorfs to large bottles, in fully closed or open systems.
Mother machine pack technical specifications
The technical specifications of the perfusion pump can be found below. Don’t hesitate to contact our team if you have any questions!
Pressure control | |
| Pressure range | -400 to 600 mbar |
| Pressure stability | 0.2 mbar |
| Air flow rate | 0.1L/min at atmospheric pressure Possibility to work with higher air flow rates by reducing the pressure range |
Flow control | |
| Flow sensor compatibility | Compatible with the whole MFS range Monitoring and feedback loop flow control available |
| Flow rates | From 0.1 µL/min to 5 mL/min |
What comes inside the box?
When you order the mother machine pack, you can expect to receive the motherboard with the desired number of units, the reservoirs, flow sensors, the software, and the cable to connect to the computer, as seen below (the laptop is only illustrative).
Customize your pack
Our instruments are compatible with standard commercialized chips from different brands.
Our instruments can be added to different setups depending on your specific needs. In this light, our microfluidic specialists will advise you on the best instruments and accessories depending on your needs and will accompany you during the system’s setup.
– Check our other instruments for various applications –
Can the mother machine pack be placed inside the microscope incubation chamber?
Yes, the mother machine pack can be used without problems inside the microscope incubation chamber, in the CO2 incubator, and on the bench.
Is the pump in the mother machine pack powered by battery?
No, the pump in the pack, the perfusion pump for microscope, is connected to a computer through a cable, which acts as a power supply.
Do I need a computer to operate the mother machine pack?
Yes, the mother machine pack requires a computer and software to work. Nonetheless, it does not require a compressed air source.
Funding and Support
The Tumor-LN-oC project helped develop this instrument. This project is funded by European Union’s H2020-NMBP-TR-IND-2020, grant agreements. No. 953234 (Tumor-LN-oC).
