KR-102963868-B1 - Apparatus for sealing plate

KR102963868B1KR 102963868 B1KR102963868 B1KR 102963868B1KR-102963868-B1

Abstract

A plate sealing device for sealing a film on a target plate according to the present invention comprises a pickup unit for receiving a heterogeneous material film including an adhesive layer and a functional layer, a tray on which a target plate is placed, a heater for applying heat to the placed film, a film detection sensor for detecting the film, and a control unit. The control unit operates the heater to apply heat to the film placed on the target plate and uses the film detection sensor to acquire information regarding the bending of the film and determines whether the film is placed in a forward direction or a reverse direction.

Inventors

육남수
노경민
한진권
윤민열
백승민

Assignees

주식회사 씨젠

Dates

Publication Date: 20260513
Application Date: 20231129

Claims (17)

In a plate sealing device for sealing a film on a target plate, A pickup unit for receiving a heterogeneous material film including an adhesive layer and a functional layer; A tray on which a target plate covered by the above-mentioned received film is placed; A heater that applies heat to the film placed on the target plate; A film detection sensor capable of detecting the above film; and It includes a control unit, and The above control unit is, Place the film received by the above pickup unit onto the above target plate, The heater is operated to apply heat to the film on the target plate, and Information regarding the bending of the film to which heat is applied is obtained using the above film detection sensor, and Determining whether the film is placed in the forward direction or in the reverse direction on the target plate using information obtained from the film detection sensor, Plate sealing device.
In Article 1, The film detection sensor acquires height information of the film at a plurality of sensing locations on the film, and The above control unit acquires information regarding the bending of the film using the height information of the film, Plate sealing device.
In Article 2, The control unit stores information regarding the increase, maintenance, or decrease of height as a calculated value through the difference in height information acquired from adjacent sensing positions, and acquires information regarding the bending of the film using the calculated value. Plate sealing device.
In Paragraph 3, The above control unit is, The resolution of the above film detection sensor is stored as a reference value, and Comparing the absolute value of the difference between the height information acquired at adjacent sensing positions with the reference value, i) determining that the height of the film between adjacent sensing positions increases or decreases when the absolute value of the difference between the height information is greater than the reference value, and ii) determining that the height of the film between adjacent sensing positions is maintained when the absolute value of the difference between the height information is equal to or less than the reference value. Plate sealing device.
In Paragraph 3, The film detection sensor acquires height information of the film at at least four of the sensing positions, and The control unit obtains information regarding the bending of the film by comparing the sum of at least three of the above-mentioned calculation values with a comparison value, Plate sealing device.
In Article 5, The resolution of the above film detection sensor is stored as a reference value, and The above calculated value is selected from (+1, 0, -1), and The above control unit is, By comparing the absolute value of the difference between the height information acquired at the adjacent sensing locations with the reference value, i) If the absolute value of the difference between the height information is greater than the reference value and the height has increased, (+1) is stored as the calculated value, and if the absolute value of the difference between the height information is greater than the reference value and the height has decreased, (-1) is stored as the calculated value. ii) If the absolute value of the difference between the height information above is equal to or smaller than the calculated value, (0) is stored as the calculated value, Plate sealing device.
In Article 5, The control unit determines that the film is positioned in the reverse direction when the sum of the calculated values is equal to or greater than the comparison value, and determines that the film is positioned in the forward direction when the sum of the calculated values is less than the comparison value. Plate sealing device.
In Paragraph 3, The above film is placed to cover a plurality of wells arranged on the upper surface of the target plate, and The plurality of sensing positions includes a first additional sensing position located on the inner side of the edge closest to the heater of the target plate, a second additional sensing position located at the center of the well closest to the heater, and one or more sensing positions that evenly divide the space between the first and second additional sensing positions. Plate sealing device.
In Paragraph 3, The film detection sensor acquires height information of the target plate at each of the sensing locations when the film is absent, and The control unit acquires i) height information from the film detection sensor and excludes it from the basis of the calculated value if it is equal to or lower than the height information of the target plate, and ii) uses the height information as the basis of the calculated value if it is greater than the height information of the target plate. Plate sealing device.
In Article 5, The film detection sensor acquires height information of the target plate at each of the sensing locations when the film is absent, and The control unit determines that the film is positioned in the correct direction if the height information acquired from two or more consecutive sensing positions, starting from the sensing position closest to the heater, is equal to or lower than the height information of the target plate. Plate sealing device.
In Article 5, The film detection sensor acquires height information of the target plate at each of the sensing locations when the film is absent, and The control unit determines that the film is positioned in the reverse direction if the height information acquired at the sensing position furthest from the heater is equal to or lower than the height information of the target plate. Plate sealing device.
In Article 1, The above target plate is a well plate in which wells are arranged in rows and columns, and The above film is provided with a size that covers all of the above wells, and A sealing unit further comprising the above heater and configured to seal the wells of the target plate with the film, Plate sealing device.
In Article 12, The above film detection sensor is mounted on the pickup unit, and The above control unit is, The target plate on which the above film is transferred is moved so as to be close to the heater, wherein the target plate is brought close to the heater within a range such that the well of the target plate is not located vertically below the heating plate of the heater. Returning the target plate to the bottom of the pickup unit after a certain period of time, Plate sealing device.
In Article 1, The tray is provided to be movable in the longitudinal direction of the target plate and is equipped with a finger member movable between the outer and inner sides in the width direction of the target plate, The finger member is configured to move from the outer side in the width direction of the target plate to the inner side when the film is placed over the target plate. Plate sealing device.
In Article 14, The finger member moves outward in the width direction of the target plate before the heater approaches the film to avoid interference with the heater. Plate sealing device.
In Article 1, It also includes a magazine capable of accommodating stacked films, The above control unit is, The tray on which the above target plate is placed is transferred to a placing position, and After the above pickup unit picks up the top film of the magazine, it transfers the film to the placing position, and Place the film on the target plate at the above placing position, The tray on which the target plate covered with the film is placed is transferred to a position close to the heater, and after a certain period of time, the tray is returned to the bottom of the pickup unit. The film detection sensor mounted on the pickup unit determines whether the film is placed in the forward direction or in the reverse direction on the target plate, and if it is determined that the film is placed in the forward direction, the tray on which the target plate covered with the film is placed is transferred to a sealing position. The heater is driven to seal the target plate with the film at the sealing position, and Transferring the tray on which the target plate sealed with the above film is placed to the discharge position, Plate sealing device.
In Article 1, The above pickup unit is configured to pick up the top sheet among the sheets from a magazine capable of accommodating sheets in which the film and slip sheets are alternately stacked. The above film detection sensor detects whether the top sheet is a film, Plate sealing device.

Description

Plate sealing apparatus {Apparatus for sealing plate} The present invention relates to a plate sealing device. With the growing interest in modern health and the extension of life expectancy, the importance of nucleic acid-based in vitro molecular diagnostics—such as the accurate analysis of pathogens and patient genetic analysis—is increasing, and demand for such services is on the rise. Nucleic acid-based molecular diagnostics is performed by extracting nucleic acids from specimen samples and then confirming the presence of a target nucleic acid among the extracted nucleic acids. Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) is the most widely used nucleic acid amplification reaction and involves a repeated cycle of denaturation of double-stranded DNA, annealing of oligonucleotide primers into a DNA template, and primer extension by DNA polymerase (Mullis et al., U.S. Patents No. 4,683,195, 4,683,202 and 4,800,159; Saiki et al., (1985) Science 230, 1350-1354). The polymerase chain reaction detection process includes placing a liquid sample into a well plate with multiple wells and sealing the well plate by covering it with a film to seal the opening formed on the upper surface of the well plate. Generally, the film used for sealing is provided in a roll type that is continuously wound on a roller. Japanese Patent Publication No. 2000-335509 discloses a method for sealing such a roll-type microplate and an automatic sealing device for a microplate. However, such roll-type sealing devices require a separate cutter to cut continuous film and multiple guide rollers to flatten the wound film. Consequently, there are issues with the device becoming larger and more expensive. To solve this problem, a sheet-type film consisting of multiple film sheets cut to fit the width of the plate can be used. However, if the film sheet is placed upside down, there is a problem that errors may occur during the process of sealing the film onto the plate. FIG. 1 is a perspective view showing the external appearance of a plate sealing device according to one embodiment. FIG. 2 is a perspective view showing the tray positioned at the loading location. Fig. 3 is a right-side view of Fig. 2. Fig. 4 is a left side view of Fig. 2. Figure 5 is a plan view of Figure 2. FIG. 6 is a perspective view showing the tray positioned at the placing position. Figure 7 is a plan view of Figure 6. FIG. 8 is a perspective view showing the tray positioned at the sealing position. FIG. 9 is a perspective view showing a magazine according to one embodiment. Figure 10 shows the magazine being mounted on a plate sealing device. FIG. 11 is a perspective view showing a pickup unit according to one embodiment. Fig. 12 is a bottom view of Fig. 11. FIG. 13 is a perspective view showing a pickup unit according to another embodiment. FIG. 14 is a perspective view showing a well plate and a tray according to one embodiment. FIG. 15 is a perspective view showing a well plate combined with a tray module. FIG. 16 is a flowchart showing the operation of a pickup unit according to one embodiment. FIG. 17 is a plan view showing a state in which a sheet is placed out of its normal position on a well plate. FIG. 18 is a side view showing the position of the sheet being detected at the front portion of the well plate. FIG. 19 is a side view showing the position of the sheet being detected at the rear end of the well plate. FIG. 20 is a flowchart showing the pre-sealing inspection sequence according to one embodiment. FIG. 21 is a side view showing the inspection of the sealing condition after the sheet sealing is completed. FIG. 22 is a flowchart showing the inspection sequence after sealing according to one embodiment. Figure 23 is a flowchart illustrating the drive shaft position calibration process. Figure 24 is a flowchart illustrating the sensing position calibration process. FIG. 25 is a diagram showing the process of separating individual sheets of a pickup unit according to one embodiment. FIGS. 26 and FIGS. 27 are side views showing the case where the sheet on the well plate is in the forward direction and the case where it is in the reverse direction. FIG. 28 is a plan view showing a sensing location for checking whether the sheet is in the forward direction. Figure 29 is a side view showing the application of heat to the sheet. FIG. 30 is a side view showing the inspection of the bending of the sheet. The present invention will be described in detail below through embodiments and exemplary drawings. These embodiments are intended solely to explain the invention more specifically, and it will be obvious to those skilled in the art that the scope of the invention is not limited by these embodiments according to the gist of the invention. In addition, it should be noted that when assigning reference numerals to the components of each drawing, the same components are assigned the same reference numeral whenever possible, even if they are shown in different drawings. Furthermor