Heineken decides to automate its laboratory with AES CHEMUNEX

Heineken, the leading brewer in Spain, uses AES CHEMUNEX equipment for the preparation and dispensing of its culture media and broths: Masterclave 09 + APS320, XY500+PM05.

Virginia Rojano Ramos, the Physics & Chemistry and Microbiology laboratory Manager, speaks about her experience in using the AES CHEMUNEX products.

"Our laboratory handles a great number of samples every day. As a consequence we have many plates and tubes to prepare on a daily basis and this task requires a lot of time."

"Since we have been using the equipment to prepare and dispense culture media, we save time, we also get reliable results as well as a full traceability of the samples thanks to the lateral printing on the plates".

"In addition to the time saving, these systems allow us to optimize the number of workers which is a great advantage for a small laboratory."

Labaqua has reduced the time to prepare culture media thanks to APS ONE + Masterclave 09 + LINX

Labaqua provides a complete range of testing and support services to the environmental industry.

Vicente Catalán, Manager of the R&D and microbiology department:

"This equipment enables us to automate the culture media preparation, reducing costs, preparation time, and also to set a standard for the quality control process."

 

The elements that have been decisive in the choice of these products: "the technology, the price and the technical service available in Spain. »

APS One new automated Petri dish filling system evaluated by the Rennes Hospital

"10 litres of culture media in just 40 minutes without reloading the carousel!"

"We were pleasantly surprised by the speed and efficiency of the APS One from AES CHEMUNEX. APS One is very reliable and can carry out a complete culture media dispensing cycle without supervision . The large plate loading capacity makes it ideal and it's a true walk-away pouring system.

Its high-speed filling rate was very useful. The double pump accessory makes this automated filler very practical for large volumes: 10 litres of media in just 40 minutes without any need to reload the carousel with empty Petri dishes!

Loading the columns of the carousel is simple as the nominal height facilitates the easy stacking of Petri dishes.

Another innovative aspect of the APS One is the pouring quality: smooth, level media in the Petri dishes without any "wave" effect. This is ideal for blood ager and chocolate agar plates.

We also appreciated the flexibility of use, clear menus, colour display screen and the fact that it is easy to use. The APS One provides high quality, sterile plates, minimizing the risk of contamination with the machine's easy to clean, smooth surfaces. The risk of contamination of sterile distributed media is radically reduced because the opening of each plate is limited to 4 seconds per Petri dish when pouring.

The facility to change the distribution volume at any time during operation is also very reassuring and practical.

We also noticed that it was easy to remove the carousel, if required, as there are no screws, but nonetheless it is an effective assembly. Furthermore the shuttle system is very accessible and easily removable allowing free access for thorough cleaning. "

M. GAUDIN - Bacteriology laboratory- CH Rennes, France

Kevin W. Smith, CLT

Bacteriology Manager

Georgia Poultry Laboratory Network

Oakwood, Ga 30566

Georgia Poultry Laboratory Network is primarily involved in environmental testing for Salmonella for several hundred poultry growers producing eggs and meat in Georgia and out-of-state growers serving Georgia. As the state agency for the National Poultry Improvement Plan, we are experiencing a dramatic increase in testing volume in response to new FDA rules for more intensive monitoring of poultry growers, which came after a recent major national outbreak.

In the Bacteriology Lab, we have a 12-person team that typically analyses between 3,000 and 7,000 environmental samples from the poultry houses (floor, boots and dust swabs) per month against over 2,000 types of Salmonella. If a meat grower tests positive, we will culture the birds. If an egg grower tests positive, especially for some of the more virulent strains of Salmonella, that grower has to provide us with 1,000 eggs every two weeks for two months. That is significant volume for an already busy lab and creates an all-hands-on-deck event for us.

Because of the volume of tests we do, we cannot afford to purchase prepared media, so we make our own media in large quantities. For one of the broths we use, we can go through up to 30 liters per day. We had people constantly boiling media to keep up, which took up a lot of time that could have been spent on other higher-level lab activities.

We purchased the Masterclave 528 because we needed an instrument with quick turnaround time, which could handle high volumes and was easy to use. Of all the instrumentation we looked at on the market, Masterclave 528 was only alternative for us. Would have needed to buy two instruments of what competitors had to offer.

Once we got the financing in place, we were up and running right away. The instrument shipped quickly, was installed promptly and staff was trained in a couple of days. It is very easy to maintain and clean up. The Masterclave 528 has exceeded all of our expectations. Now, within two hours, we can make the same amount of media it used to take us a full day to make. This has enabled us to free up staff for conducting more tests.

The Masterclave 528 is very economical in the amount of space is takes up and is very flexible and mobile. We are planning to use the instrument in two lab locations in a new facility we are building. We have already included connections for the Masterclave in the lab plans.

Masterclave 528 has really done an excellent job. It is designed just for what we need, so it has been a perfect fit for us.