JPH0661254B2 - Petri dish handling device - Google Patents

Description

Description: TECHNICAL FIELD The present invention relates to a petri dish handling device, and more particularly, to a petri dish for an automatic colony transplantation device that uses thousands of petri dishes or even tens of thousands of petri dishes. The present invention relates to a handling device.

[Prior Art] Conventionally, new bacterial species are generally treated and cultured through the following nine steps.

(1) Soil collection, (2) Dilution with water,
(3) Planting on an agar medium in a culture dish, (4)
Culturing for a certain time in an incubator, (5) Visually judging the colonies of various bacteria that have propagated on the agar medium, (6) Collecting only the desired colonies with a platinum loop, (7) Using a test dish or test tube Transfer to agar medium, (8) repeat the various tests if the bacteria are promising after culture, (9) drug,
It goes through the steps of brewing and other applications in biotechnology.

In the above steps, the visual determination and collection of a colony of a specific bacterium that seems to be promising, and the translocation were manually performed, which was a troublesome and inefficient operation. Therefore, in order to eliminate such a defect, instead of observing the culture medium of the culture dish directly with the naked eye or a microscope, an operation device that can sequentially observe the culture medium of the dish using the XY stage is used. Thus, an automatic device has been proposed and developed which performs image processing on a color TV monitor and observes the color TV by visually observing the color TV to improve work efficiency and reduce fatigue.

The colony automatic translocation device developed as an automatic device of this kind selects a predetermined colony from the medium of the source petri dish that is breeding in a state where various colonies are mixed, and automatically selects the colonies according to the selection. In addition, the cells are continuously and sequentially collected and sequentially transferred to a medium on an object (culture) petri dish.

In such a device, the work up to colony selection is performed manually, but at the stage of selection, a person operates the automatic transplanting means and gives a predetermined command through the operation panel or keyboard. After the feeding, the transplanting device collects the automatically selected colonies and automatically transplants them to an object petri dish installed in another predetermined place. Therefore, there is an advantage that manpower and fatigue are reduced, and the efficiency of the processing can be improved, although partially.

By automating the collecting work and the like after the selection as described above, it became possible to transfer the cultured source petri dish to the object petri dish within a relatively short time.

However, hundreds to thousands, and sometimes tens of thousands of petri dishes are generally used for such translocation work. Therefore,
In the automatic colony transfer work by the automatic colony transfer device, how efficiently this large amount of petri dishes are handled greatly affects the efficiency of the transfer work itself. Therefore, a magazine (or a petri dish cartridge, hereinafter referred to as a petri dish magazine including these) represented by a large number of petri dishes is used because of the handling of many petri dishes.

[Problems to be Solved by the Invention] However, even if a large number of petri dishes are processed using a magazine, there is a limit to the number of petri dishes that can be stored in one magazine. It is inefficient to set many magazines one by one when handling a petri dish.

Therefore, it is conceivable to use a plurality of magazines at the same time, but there is a drawback that the entire colony automatic transplantation device becomes large only by providing a plurality of magazines. Further, as the number of magazines increases, it becomes necessary for the operator to manage the status of each magazine.

[Object of the Invention] An object of the present invention is to solve the above-mentioned problems of the prior art, and efficiently in a colony automatic transplantation device using a petri dish reaching several thousand or tens of thousands of sheets, An object is to provide a petri dish handling device that can handle many petri dishes in a small space.

[Means for Solving the Problems] A feature of the petri dish handling apparatus of the present invention for achieving such an object is that two or more petri dishes are stacked and two-dimensionally arranged with an opening for discharging the petri dish on the upper part. Corresponding to a magazine and a row with these magazines,
The handling arm, which is positioned at the top of the dish, holds and transports the petri dish, and includes a push-up mechanism that pushes up the petri dish arranged at the bottom of a magazine in a row of the magazine.
When the bottom petri dish is pushed up by the push-up mechanism, the petri dish discharged to the upper part of the magazine is held. Alternatively, in the present invention, conversely to the above, instead of the push-up mechanism, a petri dish placed at the bottom of a magazine having the push-up mechanism is received and the petri dish is discharged to the upper part of the certain magazine. Sometimes, each time a petri dish is released, it has a descending mechanism that descends by approximately the thickness of the petri dish, and the handling arm releases the petri dish held at the top of the magazine.

[Operation] As described above, by arranging the magazines two-dimensionally, positioning the petri dish handling arm on the upper side of one row, and discharging or storing the petri dish from the upper part of the magazine, many petri dishes can be stored. Can be handled efficiently and its space is small.

Moreover, since the petri dish is taken in and out from the upper side of the magazine, the internal state of the magazine can be easily checked.

[Embodiment] An embodiment of the present invention will be described in more detail below with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a schematic plan view of the interior of an automatic colony transfer device to which the present invention is applied, FIG. 2 is a front view thereof, and FIG.
FIG. 4 is a detailed view of the handling arm, FIG. 4 is an illustration of the petri dish handling process, and FIG. 5 is an external view of the magazine.

In FIG. 1, reference numeral 1 denotes an automatic colony transfer device, in which an object petri dish transfer conveyor line 20 and a source petri dish transfer conveyor line 30 are arranged in parallel at predetermined intervals. An object petri dish supply unit 22 is arranged at an appropriate position on the upstream side of the transport conveyor line 20, and the object petri dish supply unit 22 has a plurality of magazines 21, 21, ... Petri dish 23 deposited in
The elevator mechanism arranged at the bottom of the magazine 21 pushes up one horizontal row at a time corresponding to the thickness of the petri dish.

As a result, the handling arms 10 (not shown in FIG. 1; see FIG. 2) arranged at the top of the petri dish for one row protruding to the top are simultaneously taken out and transported to the transport conveyor line 20. .

Similarly, the source petri dish supply unit 32 is disposed at an appropriate position on the upstream side of the source conveyor dish transport conveyor line 30, and the source petri dish supply unit 32 includes a plurality of magazines 2
, 1, 2, ... Are similarly arranged two-dimensionally, and the source petri dish 24 deposited thereon corresponds to the thickness of the petri dish at the same time in one horizontal row by the elevator mechanism arranged at the bottom of the magazine 21. Only pushed up.

As a result, as in the case described above, the petri dish for one row protruding to the uppermost portion is simultaneously taken out by the handling arm 10 (see FIG. 2) arranged on the upper portion, and is conveyed to the conveyance conveyor line 30. Here, the source petri dish is taken out for one row, but if the petri dish is stored in only one of the magazines in one row, only one petri dish is taken out onto the transport conveyor line 30. You can This also applies to the object petri dish side.

As shown in FIG. 1, the object petri dish 23 on the transport conveyor line 20 rides on the driven transport conveyor line 20 and is advanced to reach the front position of the petri dish handling unit 40a.

Similarly, the source dish 2 on the conveyor line 30
4 also flows along the transport conveyor line 30 which is independently driven, and is advanced to reach the front position of the petri dish handling section 40b. Then, each of them is sandwiched and fixed by a petri dish clamping pressure holding means (not shown), the lid is taken off by petri dish lid attaching / detaching means (not shown), and selected from the source petri dish 24 in the inside state of the lid. The colony transplanting section 40 carries out the operation of transplanting the colony (1) to the object petri dish 23, which is positioned on the side opposite to the source petri dish 24 and has the lid removed.

Reference numeral 43 denotes a moving mechanism of the transfer arm arranged at the base of the colony transfer means 40.

The object petri dish 23 after the completion of the transplantation is capped again by the petri dish lid attaching / detaching means. Thereafter, the pressing force applied to the petri dish clamping pressure holding means is released, and the conveyor is driven to advance the petri dish with the completed transplantation, and the petri dish is discharged from the transposition work section. The discharged petri dish moves forward on the conveyor line in sequence.

Reference numeral 25 is a box of transplanting needles, and the transplanting needles 25 are attached to the tips of the transfer arms of the colony transferring means 40.

As with the upstream, a transplanted object petri dish storage unit 50 is arranged at an appropriate position on the downstream side of the object petri dish transfer conveyor line 20. It has a two-dimensional array of magazines 21, similar to the upstream side. Then, when a predetermined number of petri dishes are accumulated on the conveyor line at a position opposite to the object petri dish storage unit 50, the handling arm 10 handles the petri dishes and the magazine 21 of the transplanted object petri dish storage unit 50.
Store inside.

Similarly, the source petri dish 24 after completion of the translocation is again capped by the petri dish lid attaching / detaching means, and then the pressing force applied to the petri dish clamping pressure holding means is released, and the conveyor is driven to complete the transposition. The petri dish is advanced and discharged from the translocation work area. The discharged petri dish moves forward on the conveyor line in sequence.

Then, the object petri dish storage unit 50 is placed at an appropriate position on the downstream side of the source petri dish transport conveyor line 30.
A used source petri dish storage unit 60 having a two-dimensional array of magazines 21 similar to the above is disposed.

As shown in FIG. 2, a camera 70 is arranged above the petri dish handling section 40b of the source petri dish 24, and a CRT display 71 is installed beside it. The magazine 21 shown in FIG.
As shown in the figure, four columns are combined to form one column, which is arranged in two columns in four columns.

As shown in FIG. 5, each magazine 21 has a rectangular upper frame 2 on the upper side and a lower frame 3 having a similar rectangular shape on the lower side and having a corresponding size. Between the upper frame 2 and the lower frame 3, four pipe members 4 are provided at four corners with the same length.

The upper frame 2 is provided with an opening 5 corresponding to a petri dish slightly larger than the outer shape of the petri dish to be housed (the outer diameter including the lid of the petri dish) in the central portion thereof. Is a notch 6 continuous with this
To form an open opening. Further, around the opening 5, a taper 5a having an open upper side is formed,
The petri dish is easy to put in and take out.

The lower frame 3 on the lower side is also provided with an opening 7 having a diameter smaller than the outer shape of the petri dish (the outer diameter of the main body of the petri dish) to be housed in the central portion thereof.
Also has an opening opened by the notch 8 continuous with this. Moreover, the notch 8 is provided in the direction opposite to the notch 6, thereby improving the strength and accuracy.

On the other hand, the diameters of the upper portions of the four pipe members 4, 4, 4, 4 are successively reduced so as to be continuous with the lower side 5b of the opening 5.

The petri dish accommodated by the above configuration can be accumulated without a gap, and the inner portions (part of the outer circumference) of the outer circumferences of the four pipe members are in contact with the outer side of the petri dish in a circular contact form close to point contact, so that the petri dish is stored. The petri dish serves as a guide and is housed in an inner space surrounded by these four pipe members.

In this case, the petri dish to be stored is less likely to be damaged,
In addition, the pipe member can be accurately positioned on the outer periphery of the pipe member for storage and discharge. Moreover, the taper 5a and the pipe member 4
It is very easy to put in and take it out due to the outer circumference of.

Next, the handling of the petri dish will be described with reference to FIGS. 3 and 4.

As shown in FIG. 3, a plurality of object petri dishes 23, 23 (or source petri dishes 24, 24, hereinafter referred to as petri dishes 23) accumulated in four magazines in one row (of which two inside are omitted) are representative of these petri dishes. ) 、 ・
.. are simultaneously raised or lowered by the elevator mechanism 13 shown in FIG.

The handling arm 10 has four petri dishes 23, 23, 23, 2 on top of which the elevator mechanism 13 is deposited.
3 is provided on the upper side of the No. 3 and has gripping arms 14 that sandwich and transfer the petri dish 23 on both side surfaces.

The gripping arms 14 are arranged substantially parallel to each other with the interval L slightly larger than the size of the petri dish 23 when the petri dish 23 is sandwiched therebetween.
And the slide shafts 17 and 17 that penetrate the holding frames 15 and 16 and allow them to slide relative to each other.
In addition, the gap expanding mechanisms 18 and 18 provided on both sides of the gripping frames 15 and 16 and the support frame 11 are provided. Interval expansion mechanism 18,
18 is composed of air cylinders 18a, 18a in which pins 19, 19 are fitted on both sides, and springs 18b, 18b,
The other ends of the pins 19 and 19 are planted on the side wall surfaces of both ends of the grip frames 15 and 16, respectively. Further, the springs 18b and 18b are respectively in the stretched state,
It is laid across both ends of 5,16.

On the other hand, the support frame 11 is movably supported in the direction indicated by the arrow and is fixed to the front-rear moving arm 11a.
Rubber gripping members 12a and 12b each having a valley-shaped depression are fixed to the gripping frames 15 and 16 at four locations (two locations in the drawing, and the rest is omitted). These sandwiching members 12a and 12b oppose each other at a width position equal to the outer diameter thereof to sandwich the side wall of the dish 23 when sandwiching the dish 23.

Here, when high-pressure air is introduced into the air cylinders 18a, 18a, the first and second grip frames 15,
16 is pushed outward by the pins 19 and 19 to increase the distance L, and the distance between the sandwiching members 12a and 12b where the pressure is applied becomes larger than the size of the petri dish 23. When the air is exhausted from the air cylinders 18a, 18a, the gripping frames 15, 16 are drawn to each other up to the holding interval L by the action of the springs 18b, 18b, and the petri dish 23 inserted between them is held by the holding member 12.
It is held by being pinched by a and 12b.

On the other hand, the elevator mechanism 13 shown in FIG.
A ball screw mechanism 132 coupled to 31 and a push-up arm 133 having a ball nut portion embedded therein are provided, and the motor 131 is fixed to the base frame 130. Here, the push-up arms 133 are stacked on the magazine 21 arranged in a row of four petri dishes 23, 23,
It has a comb shape (see FIG. 3) that is pressed against the center position of the bottom of the bottom of 23, 23.

In FIG. 4, only the front two magazines 21 are shown and the rear side is omitted.

In addition, petri dishes 23 stacked in individual magazines 21,
As shown in FIG. 4, the magazines 23, ... Are sequentially stacked and arranged without a gap, and the magazine mounting table 135 on which the magazines 21 are mounted corresponds to the magazine width of one row by the motor 136. Move the column back and forth.

The control circuit 137 shown in FIG. 4 controls the motor 136 in order to control the forward / backward movement, and also controls the handling arm 10 (in particular, the rotating arm 11a and the air cylinders 18a, 18a) and the motor 131 of the elevator mechanism 13. And control.

Next, the petri dish handling operation of taking out the petri dish from the magazine on the side of the petri dish supply unit will be mainly described.

First, under the control of the control circuit 137, the front-rear moving arm 11a is operated from a predetermined position to move the handling arm 10a.
Is moved to the top of a certain magazine row, which is the petri dish discharge position, and then stopped. Next, the air cylinder 18
The high pressure air is introduced into a and 18a to increase the distance between the first and second gripping frames 15 and 16, and the holding member 1
The facing distance between 2a and 12b is made larger than the outer shape of the petri dish 23.

At this point, the control circuit 137 drives the motor 131 to raise the push-up arm 133 of the elevator mechanism 13 by the height of one petri dish. As a result, the uppermost Petri dish 23 of the stacked Petri dishes 23 is sandwiched by the holding members 12a, 12
It is arranged between b and the raising arm 133 stops rising at this position.

Next, the control circuit 137 controls the air cylinders 18a, 18a.
The high-pressure air is exhausted, and the springs 18b and 18b close the first and second gripping frames 15 and 16 and close the outer side surface of the petri dish 23.
Therefore, the four uppermost petri dishes 23, 23, 23, 23 of the magazines 21 arranged in one row are simultaneously clamped by the clamping members 12a, 12b, respectively.

Next, the control circuit 137 drives the front-rear moving arm 11a to simultaneously transfer the grasped four petri dishes 23 to the upper part of the conveyor line and discharge them onto the belt.

Here, when the petri dish 23 is provided with a lid, the petri dish main body and the lid are simultaneously transferred. For this simultaneous transfer, since the sandwiching members 12a and 12b use elastic bodies respectively, the elastic body is used to clamp the petri dish main body and the lid, but in this case, the lower side of the sandwiching members 12a and 12b. By forming the stepped shape with a slight protrusion, it is possible to surely hold the lower side portion of the lid portion of the petri dish.

By the way, when all the petri dishes 23 of the one-row magazines 21, 21, 21, 21 are emptied, the all-empty one-row magazines 21, 21, 21, 21 are taken out of the array or discharged. The control circuit 13
7, the control circuit 137 drives the motor 136 that moves the magazine mounting table 135 back and forth to move it forward by a width corresponding to one row, and arranges and positions the next row of the magazine at the position of the handling arm 10. , Start the work of picking up petri dishes for each magazine in this row.

It should be noted that whether or not the magazine has no petri dish in the magazine can be easily known from the raised position of the elevator mechanism 13.

Further, since the petri dish is taken in and out from the upper side of the magazine, it can be easily detected even if the optical sensor is arranged on the upper side, and the operator can easily check the internal state of the magazine by directly looking from above.

On the other hand, regarding the storage, the operation of the handling arm 10 is reversed, and with the descending operation of the elevator mechanism, the storage of the petri dishes is sequentially stored in the magazine 21 from the top, and at the time when the petri dishes are completed at the front of the magazine in one row,
The next row of empty magazines is moved and positioned. The details of the operation will be omitted because it is almost the same as the case of taking out the petri dish.

As described above, in the embodiment, the handling arm is set at the predetermined gripping position (disposition of the petri dish) of the discharge petri dishes from the two-dimensionally arranged magazines, and the magazine side rows are sequentially positioned at that position. However, this is with the magazine array side fixed,
The handling arm side may be set so as to position each row in sequence in accordance with the magazine array.

Further, in the embodiment, the handling arm is described as picking up one row of petri dishes from one row of magazines at the same time, but any of the petri dishes may be picked up.

[Effects of the Invention] As described above, in the petri dish handling apparatus of the present invention, the magazines are two-dimensionally arranged, the petri dish handling arm is positioned above one row of the magazines, and the petri dish is placed from the top of the magazine. By discharging or storing the petri dish, many petri dishes can be efficiently handled and the space thereof can be reduced.

Moreover, since the petri dish is taken in and out from the upper side of the magazine, the internal state of the magazine can be easily checked.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a schematic plan view of the interior of an automatic colony transfer device to which the present invention is applied, FIG. 2 is a front view thereof, and FIG.
FIG. 4 is a detailed view of the handling arm, FIG. 4 is an illustration of the petri dish handling process, and FIG. 5 is an external view of the magazine. 1 ... Automatic colony transfer device, 2 ... Upper frame, 3 ... Lower frame, 4 ... Pipe member, 5, 7 ... Opening part, 6, 9
… Notches, 8… Notches, 10… Handling arms, 1
1 ... Support frame, 12a, 12b ... Clamping member, 13 ...
Elevator mechanism, 14 ... Gripping arm, 15 ... First gripping frame, 16 ... Second gripping frame, 17 ... Slide shaft, 18a ... Interval expanding mechanism, 18b ... Spring, 19 ... Pin, 20 ... Object petri dish conveyor Line, 21 ... Magazine, 23 ... Object dish, 2
4 ... Source petri dish, 30 ... Source petri dish, conveyer conveyor line, 131, 136 ... Motor, 132 ... Ball screw mechanism, 133 ... Push-up arm, 135 ... Magazine mounting table.

Claims (5)

[Claims] 1. A two-dimensionally arranged magazine having a plurality of petri dishes and an opening through which the petri dishes are discharged, and a magazine positioned in the upper part of the magazine corresponding to a certain row of the magazines to grasp the petri dish. And a handling arm for transferring and a push-up mechanism for pushing up a petri dish arranged at the bottom of a magazine among the one row of magazines, and the handling arm pushes up the petri dish at the bottom by the push-up mechanism. A petri dish handling device, which holds a petri dish discharged to the upper part of the certain magazine when the petri dish is held. 2. The push-up mechanism receives a petri dish placed at the bottom of the certain magazine, and when the petri dish is released to the upper part of the certain magazine, the petri dish is discharged by about the thickness of each petri dish. The petri dish handling device according to claim 1, wherein the petri dish is a descent mechanism for lowering the petri dish by the handling arm, and the petri dish held by the handling arm is released at an upper part of the certain magazine. 3. A push-up mechanism pushes up a petri dish arranged at the bottom of the certain magazine and receives a petri dish arranged at the bottom of the certain magazine or another magazine, or the certain magazine or When the petri dish is released to the upper part of another magazine, it is an elevator mechanism that descends by about the thickness of the petri dish each time the petri dish is released, and the handling arm has the lowermost petri dish pushed up by the elevator mechanism. The petri dish handling device according to claim 1, wherein the petri dish that is sometimes discharged to the upper part of the certain magazine is gripped and the petri dish that grips is discharged at the upper part of the certain magazine or another magazine. 4. A two-dimensionally arranged magazine is movably supported by a handling arm in a direction in which the next row is positioned, and the handling arm is positioned at a predetermined position corresponding to the one row of the magazine. When the one row magazine located below the position becomes empty, or when a predetermined amount of petri dishes are stored in the one row magazine, the next row magazine following this row is positioned below the handling arm. The petri dish handling device according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the petri dish handling device is provided. 5. The handling arm grips petri dishes discharged from each magazine of one row of magazines at the same time or discharges petri dishes to each magazine at the same time. Petri dish handling equipment.