Microarray manufacturing is an area that is plagued with numerous technical challenges due, in part, to the complexity of the systems involved and to the variety of proteins and potential assays used.

In recent years, the growing trend to resolving workload jams and bottlenecks within laboratories has been to rely on automation. But is machinery and automation really the answer, or is the problem more deeply seated? Could the issues instead be resolved by looking at the processes and methods of working?

Both big and small labs have many problems in common but often use different methods to solve them.

Just as there are a variety of options to choose from when selecting an instrument, there are a variety of ways to maintain them. One such option is the integrated service model, which seems to work best for a lab of our size, whose ouput is approximately one thousand samples a day.