Genefoo gelfoo concept.
A web-enabled system for gel-documentation. Posts images to dropbox, evernote. Hypothesis: users waste time getting images from camera to lab notebook.
Gels?
Gel electrophoresis is a routine (i.e. daily) technique used in molecular biology labs to separate DNA molecules from one another based on differences in their length. A 1.5% agarose gel can discriminate DNA fragments with lengths between 200 base pairs (bp) and 3000 bp (3 kb). To run and image a gel, the following equipment is needed:
agarose, dh2o, gel buffer (TBE, TAE), DNA binding dye, running & loading buffer
gel casting tray, submarine gel box, comb
power supply - establishes 100-300v electric field across gel
transilluminator - excites bound DNA dye
"geldoc" imager - box that fits on top of transilluminator & holds a camera with filter. The filter cuts out the transilluminator light and passes the light from the fluorescing DNA-bound dye.
Several open-source kits and designs exist for most of these components (not reagents though), and $500 gel box + power supply products are available commercially. But not for the gel imager.
So! Here at genefoo we're working on an affordable & open-source design everything needed to do gel imaging: a transilluminator + geldoc & camera. Here's the plan:
transilluminator
Blue led transilluminator that couples to imaging hood. Big - 9 x 12 in? Possibly with custom manufactured acrylic filters. Built with LED strips (5050SMDs?) One button: on / off. How is the chassis assembled?
hood
Light-tight gel imaging hood that holds camera module, enables z-movement for focus / zoom, perhaps holds filter for camera module, and mates with the top of blue transilluminator. Vacuum cast.
imager + server
Low-cost SoC server + camera - possibly raspberry pi + raspicam module or beaglebone + usb camera, a la openrov.org.
Server (implemented in node?) provides on-demand low-latency low-res ("live") preview of the inside of the geldoc chamber and prompt for capturing a full-resolution image. Image is saved locally and optionally pushed to dropbox (or evernote via email). Images can also be printed with google printer sharing. Supports mobile and desktop browsers.
Plugin architecture for extending the system - starting with image analysis of the gel to "call" the band sizes and estimate DNA concentration w/ densitometry. This metadata is stored with the image locally.