TipCharger by IonField Systems: How It Works
TipCharger utilizes plasma to clean pipet tips. Plasma cleaning has been known for over a hundred years and is widely used in manufacturing. Most applications process what’s being cleaned in batches using reduced pressure chambers and special gas mixtures. The TipCharger applies an air plasma technology and a quick, inline process that integrates with any liquid handler and application. Pipets are cleaned and sterilized in seconds using about the same amount of power as a light bulb.
When tips are introduced into the TipCharger Cleaning Station, an electric field is produced inside the TipCharger — shown above. The electric field creates a discharge which results in the air around each tip being turned into room temperature plasma — the blue/purple color. The plasma transfers energy to the molecules on the surfaces of the pipet tip, shattering them into individual atoms which combine with Oxygen. The “waste” generated by a TipCharger is mostly CO2 and H2O.Our plasma cleaning technology generates no solid or liquid waste. The "green" benefit of plasma technology in the automated lab equates to a virtual elimination of hazardous waste from the cleaning process since no solvents are used and the volume of disposable plastic tips reduced by 99%.
For details, read our white paper Plasma-based Cleansing Techniques for Biopharmaceutical Research: An Introduction to and Explanation of the Technology by Geoffrey Schwartz (650k PDF)