Zebrafish Embryo Dispenser - ZED

Gunnlaugur Steinar GuðmundssonÓli Sævar ÓlafssonRúnar Viggósson

Örnólfur Þórir Örnólfsson

What is an Zebra fish embrio and what do you do with them

The new lab rats (the test rats)• Used in different stages,

3Z begin the testing when 4-7 days old

• 3Z uses the embryos to research sleeping behavior.

• Reaction of a whole organism

• The biggest advantage is they breed very quickly

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AZebrafish_embryos.png

http://www.freakingnews.com/Zebrafish-Pics-43457.asp

Functional requirements• Get the embryos from the

container into something more suiteble

• Line the embryos up for splitting• Split the embryos up• Detect an embryo or no embryo• Dispense a single embryo to the

wellplate• 350 µl/well• No is better than two

•http://www.nanopartz.com/Inspiration.htm

The problem has been solved before by Union Biometica

But with some drawbacks for our mission:• Works only good for

the embryos before they can move.

• Comes with a lot of devices we don´t need.

• Costs about $300.000 before shipping and taxes

http://www.unionbio.com/copas/

Design parameters (ideas)

• Use a spiral pump (must be fed)• Use a syringe and a small tube• Put the embryos on a shrimp grader• Use a break beam sensor• Use a delta robot to pick the embryos up and

put in the wellplate

Experiments on concepts

• Picking up embryos

Experiments on concepts

• Embryos in a syringe

Design parameters (final idea)

• Pour manually to the container• Use a syringe and a small tube• Use a syringe (or a pump), connect it to the tube

from the syringe and flush out the embryo if needed

• Use a break beam sensor• Use the 3D printer at the end of the tube to move

the wellplate• Valve somewhere on the way to divert the flow

Experiment on concepts

• Bracket for sensor

Experiments on concepts

• Break beam sensor

Final design

3D printer

To summarize

• Challanging problem– Hard because of the size of the fishes

• $1,174 vs $300,000