Mosquito X1

The mosquito X1 is SPT Labtech’s single-channel positive-displacement nanolitre pipettor, built for high-speed low-volume hit-picking. Each transfer uses a disposable micropipette with its own piston, so there is a fresh tip on every transfer and no wash step, no carry-over and no viscosity calibration. SPT Labtech publishes accuracy as “an average of less than 3% error throughout the volume range” and precision as “average CVs of 3%”.

Revolution drives the instrument through mosquito software — SPT Labtech’s own control application, currently published at v4.1 — rather than reimplementing pipetting. Protocols, wizards and plate designs are authored there, and the schedule decides when a protocol runs and moves plates on and off the deck around it. That division matters when you read the supported methods below: this driver is a protocol runner and a deck handler, not a pipetting API.

At a glance

Technology	Single-channel positive-displacement pipetting using disposable micropipettes with individual pistons — a fresh tip per transfer, no wash
Volume range	25 nL – 1.2 µL (LV pipetting head); 500 nL – 5 µL (HV pipetting head)
Cycle time	Average of 6 seconds per compound (aspirate, move, dispense, change tip)
Deck	2 plate positions, parking at Position1 for robot access
Plate formats	96, 384 and 1,536 well, plus other supported microplates
Instrument software	mosquito software (required — Revolution runs mosquito protocol files, it does not replace them)
Revolution control	Run a protocol file, park the deck for robot access, reset and home

Specifications

As published by SPT Labtech for the mosquito X1.

Volume range	”25 nL - 1.2 μL (LV) or 500 nL - 5 μL (HV)“
Configuration	Single-channel positive-displacement pipetting
Cycle time	”Average of 6 seconds cycle time (aspirate, move, dispense, change tip)“
Deck	2 plate positions
Plate formats	96, 384 and 1,536, plus other supported microplates
Dimensions (W × D × H)	390 mm × 470 mm × 690 mm — 15.5 in × 18.5 in × 27 in
Weight	27 kg (59 lbs)

The published 6-second cycle time is per compound, for the single channel doing the whole aspirate–move–dispense–change-tip loop. It is the number to plan a hit-picking schedule around: a 384-pick run is a matter of tens of minutes on the instrument, so the surrounding robot moves and the plate survey work elsewhere in the system tend to dominate the cycle, not the mosquito X1.

Supported methods

Revolution exposes three operations. All the pipetting lives in the protocol file, which is authored in mosquito software; the driver loads it and runs it.

• Run method — load and run a mosquito protocol. Takes Protocol File Path, described in the driver as the “Filepath to the Mosquito protocol file. The .protocol file created with the Mosquito software”, and Timeout, the time to wait for a response from the instrument. Timeout defaults to 0, which explicitly means no timeout — the schedule waits for the protocol to finish. Set a real value only if you would rather the schedule fail than block on a long protocol
• Move to park position — move the deck so that a named deck position is presented for robot access. Positions are Position1 and Position2
• Reset and home instrument — reset and home the mosquito X1. This also runs automatically on initialisation, followed by a deck park, so the instrument is in a known state before the first scheduled operation

There is deliberately no aspirate, dispense, transfer, serial-dilution or hit-pick operation. Those are protocol-level concepts and they belong to mosquito software; the schedule composes them by choosing which protocol file to run. If a workflow needs the schedule itself to vary a dilution series or a pick list, that is a driver extension, not existing configuration.

Integration

Revolution connects to mosquito software over .NET remoting on a TCP URL, binding to two remote objects on the same host: the instrument automation interface and the deck automation interface. If the software is not running, the driver reports it plainly — a socket failure is surfaced as a request to check that the mosquito software is started and running, rather than as a transport error.

Deck handling is the part of this integration that needs thought. The mosquito X1 deck moves, and it moves through space a robot arm also wants to occupy. The driver therefore parks the deck at Position1 before every pick and every place at one of its own locations, mapping the location index to the matching deck position automatically. There is also an optional mode that parks the deck before pick and place operations at locations that are not the mosquito X1’s — for systems where the deck can collide with the arm while it services a neighbouring stacker or decapper.

The deck also clamps plates into the corner of the nest, which means a plate is generally sitting a small distance from where the robot set it down. The driver handles this with a bespoke pick that applies a configurable X/Y offset, capped at 5 mm. Without it, picking from the deck and placing into a tight stack is unreliable.

Plate names and barcodes can be pushed to the instrument so that they appear in the mosquito report file, which is what ties a scheduled run back to the plates it actually touched.

Prerequisites

• mosquito software must be installed and running on the instrument PC, with its automation interface enabled, before the device is initialised. Revolution runs protocol files through it and does not drive the hardware directly
• The protocol files the schedule references must exist and be reachable at the paths configured, having been created in mosquito software
• Robot teach positions must account for the deck being parked, and the pick offsets below must be set, before a robot is allowed to pick from the deck

Device configuration

The Mosquito X1 device class drives the 2 plate position deck.

Property	Purpose
Remote Url	TCP remoting address of the mosquito software’s automation interface
Pick Offset X	X offset applied by the bespoke deck pick, compensating for the deck clamp. Capped at 5 mm
Pick Offset Y	Y offset applied by the bespoke deck pick. Capped at 5 mm
Auto Park Deck for robot operations	Park the deck before pick and place operations at locations belonging to other devices, where the deck would otherwise be in the arm’s way

Deck positions are additionally mapped to the robot position they are serviced from, so the driver can refuse an operation on a deck position the robot cannot reach rather than attempting a move that would fail.

If your instrument has the 5 plate position deck instead, see Mosquito — it is a distinct Revolution device class. For any other mosquito deck or pipetting-head variant, or if you need more of this instrument driven from a schedule, get in touch — the driver is extended on demand.