A Danish pipetting robot is automating coronavirus testing processes in European hospitals. The robot, called flowbot ONE, significantly reduces the time it takes for laboratories to produce results for patients potentially infected with SARS-CoV-2.
A special liquid-handling robot from Denmark is now speeding up the task of analysing coronavirus tests. Every day, thousands of tests are being prepared for analysis by the sophisticated flowbot ONE from Flow Robotics. Robot technology minimises the risk of human error and contagion in the process, and it reduces the physically demanding pipetting tasks for laboratory personnel.
Eight Danish hospitals have chosen the Danish invention, which is also being used by their partners DTU and Novo Nordisk. A German laboratory, which had actually purchased the Danish robot to test for Salmonella in food is now also using flowbot ONE when samples from German patients need to be analysed.
Orders for the Danish liquid-handling robots have also come from Sweden, Poland, Russia, the Netherlands and Australia. Flow Robotics’ home in Denmark is not the only place where the health authorities have discovered the potential of automating part of the testing effort during the coronavirus pandemic.
Since the beginning of May 2020, Flow Robotics has been helping to optimise the intensive work of analysing coronavirus samples in Denmark. In just three weeks, Flow Robotics can manufacture, supply and install 12 robots ready for use.