How the latest microplate reading technology can revolutionize life in the lab

Microplate readers are an integral part of everyday life for many scientists over a wide range of life sciences applications. The type of microplate reader you have will affect the efficiency and capacity of your lab’s processes, from scientific research to manufacturing workflows. It is therefore important that labs are equipped with the best microplate reader for their unique applications.

In this SelectScience^® interview, we speak with Eric Matthews, Vice President of Sales for North America at BMG LABTECH, who discusses advancements in microplate reader technology, gives insight into BMG LABTECH’s mission to produce quality plate readers, and introduces BMG LABTECH’s latest product, the VANTAstar™. Matthews also highlights how the VANTAstar addresses the challenges faced by scientists from drug discovery and screening to benchtop R&D and academic labs.

What are the overall aims of BMG LABTECH and its products?

EM: BMG LABTECH is “the microplate reader company”. We have been focusing on microplate detection and on producing quality plate readers for every kind of user for more than 30 years. If users are focused on drug discovery and screening, we want to produce the best reader for them, one that provides the highest data quality from challenging assays, rapidly. For benchtop R&D and academic labs, our goal is to provide easy-to-use, dependable tools that don’t get in the way of users acquiring great data.

How has microplate reader technology advanced in recent decades?

EM: There’s an axiom that there are only two ways to create a business, one is to bundle something, and the other way is to unbundle something. Whether or not that’s true, it sometimes feels true. The dominant technology trend in plate readers for two decades has been to take read modes that used to only exist in separate instruments—say absorbance, luminescence—and put them into on a single device; at first with some obvious trade-offs for the user and later, eventually, without compromises.

This trend continues as companies add cellular imaging capabilities, bundling what used to be a separate, dedicated instrument into a microplate reader housing. So far, that still requires researchers to balance trade-offs in detection quality. Plate-reader manufacturers are now pendulum like, swinging back to focus on improving core parts of the user experience. In the last few years, the addition of atmospheric-control, dedicated excitation lasers, application-specific detectors, automatic sensitivity optimization, and tunable dichroic mirrors that users don’t have to think about or adjust, has been a reversal of a two-decade trend. Readers are becoming specifically better at doing their main job, measuring microplate assays, so that people in the lab can focus on the science.

What are the biggest challenges your customers are facing today?

EM: At every level, customers are interested to see technology work as a lever - a fulcrum - that advances their knowledge and their time. They want to spend their lab hours thinking about biology and not the logistics of how to get their data or wondering whether they have the right data, or enough of it. This has been important for years, but the pandemic accelerated the trend of letting researchers use their minds creatively to do research and not use their time to simply complete tasks. Everyone that has spent time in a lab understands how a liquid handler automates the boring, manual task of removing liquid from wells and then adding more back. But during the pandemic, that sort of tool stopped being a luxury and started being a necessity. If users can’t be in the lab more than a day or two each week, their time there needs to be leveraged, optimized, and productive. It’s more important than ever that lab equipment, and especially detection technology, lets scientists be scientists and not technicians. Our customers want reading a plate to be more like Googling an answer and less like spending an afternoon thumbing through card files in the library.

How does the VANTAstar address these challenges?

EM: The VANTAstar has several design aspects that make it perfect for benchtop research. Most importantly, we’ve focused on including the components that every researcher needs and removing complexity. A streamlined, focused instrument takes up less space on the bench and makes manufacturing it more efficient, providing value to customers. Besides size and value, the focus of the VANTAstar is on ease of use. The assay optimization settings we have introduced are like an autopilot for test optimization. Both brand new lab members and plate reader power-users will each get great data without having to move apertures, adjust sensitivity settings, or optimize focal heights.

What features set the VANTAstar apart from current microplate readers on the market?

EM: Enhanced dynamic range (EDR) is a technology that removes sensitivity settings and focus optimization from the list of things most users need to understand or even think about. EDR means that if an inexperienced user walks up to the reader, all their samples will have low noise. The dimmest fluorescence or luminescent wells will be read with the maximum sensitivity and the brightest wells won’t be maxed out or saturated. It doesn’t add time to a test and it works even if signal intensity rapidly and dramatically increases during a measurement.

The other key feature in the VANTAstar is that we’ve brought BMG LABTECH’s proprietary LVF MonochromatorTM and tunable Linear Variable Dichroic Mirror into a new instrument. These increase efficiency over conventional monochromators, meaning that VANTAstar users get great data without having to wonder if they have an optical setup that performs well enough. They do. An LVF Monochromator from BMG LABTECH is more sensitive than most other reader’s filters, so it removes an entire area of training, operation, and assay optimization from most fluorescence measurements.

Who would benefit from incorporating the VANTAstar into their everyday workflows?

EM: A lot of scientists loved using a BMG LABTECH reader before, and are interested in having one in their lab, but they may not be interested in advanced methods like AlphaScreen® or tackling high-density plate formats such as 1536. The VANTAstar is for these users who would like the usability and performance of a BMG LABTECH reader but want an instrument focused on most lab’s core needs. Because the VANTAstar has a smaller footprint, an easy-to-access plate-carrier profile, and optimization and aperture settings that operate on autopilot, it’s also an ideal reader to integrate into a robotic deck or a liquid handling workstation.

What applications can the VANTAstar cover?

EM: The VANTAstar measures fluorescence with a monochromator, filters, or a combination of the two. The instrument covers any luminescence assays (including BRET with filters or a monochromator) and every common absorbance assay that uses a tunable spectrometer. It will also measure time-resolved fluorescence, TR-FRET, and fluorescence polarization.

What do you see for the future of BMG LABTECH and the VANTAstar?

EM: BMG LABTECH is the only remaining major independent manufacturer of plate readers. Our goal of remaining engineering-focused requires us to also remain customer-focused. Everyone understands why printer cartridges cost as much as the inkjet itself. BMG LABTECH doesn’t want to force customers to buy a product from us by introducing friction into the usability of a secondary products. The VANTAstar has been produced because BMG LABTECH has one way to sell microplate readers - by making products that our customers want to use. Scientists are going to love the VANTAstar because researchers can tell when a company focuses on a core competency and produces the best products it can.

Find out more about how VANTAstar can benefit your workflows >>