Automated Sample preparation & liquid handling
The problem
As biologics and gene therapies move through development, they get harder to handle. High-concentration proteins, viral vectors, and nanoparticle formulations become thick, sticky, and tough to move accurately. Pipetting viscous solutions or sticky suspensions by hand is slow, inconsistent, and prone to air bubbles and waste. Every transfer adds shear stress that can denature proteins, shear capsids, or break delicate complexes.
Formulation work isn’t just about precision — it’s about protection. Keeping samples cold, contamination-free, and homogeneous while preparing hundreds of aliquots or formulations by hand takes time and extreme focus. Even small inconsistencies in volume, mixing, or handling can throw off results, shift stability data, and compromise critical developability insights.
The right tool for the job
Stuntman combines built-in AI with modular hardware to take on every formulation challenge in biologics and gene therapy sample prep. Turn your natural-language prompts into executable scripts that can orchestrate closed-loop automation from start to finish. Stuntman’s AI helps plan and organize experiments, interpret results, and guide how things progress. Design, execute, and analyze experiments all in one place using Stuntman AI, intuitive drag-and-drop interface workflows, or Python with full API access. Every step is tracked in real time and logged as it happens. All this control means you can trust your data and draw the right conclusions from it.
Deck it out your way to automate powder dosing, viscous liquid transfers, filtration, aliquoting, and sealing – all under controlled conditions. Stuntman manages everything from thin buffers to high-viscosity protein, viral vector, or nanoparticles, keeping even the most sensitive materials stable.
What’s possible
Automated powder dispensing
Accurate powder dosing is the foundation of reliable formulation – whether its salts, sugars, excipients, stabilizers, and other powder components. Setup a powder dispensing experiment and Stuntman will take care of the rest with two hopper formats – SV and Classic hoppers – dosing sub-milligram to gram scale. Powder can be dispensed into plates or vials that have been moved into a balance. A powder hopper is aligned to the destination within the balance and gravimetrically dispensed until the target is reached. This process is repeated, switching hoppers and destinations until the experiment setup is complete.
The software tracks how much powder was added to each hopper and knows when it’s running low. Tracking is done across multiple experiments, so you don’t have to stop and open the hopper to see what’s still left. The powder dispensing algorithm slows down or speeds up to reach your target and provides good repeatability (±0.2 mg) for dispenses under 1 mg. A high-sensitivity balance measures the gravimetric dispense in real time and is closed off during the dispense, eliminating air flow disruption.
One-to-many powder dispensing
Large hoppers are ideal for one-to-many dispenses, where the same powder goes into multiple wells. Classic hoppers use a stirring wire to keep even clumpy or hygroscopic powders flowing smoothly, while adjustable valve and funnel sizes let you tailor flow for different particle types. Hoppers are available in 10, 25, 50, and 100 mL volumes, and multiple hoppers of any combination can be mounted on the deck. Adaptive algorithms learn each powder’s flow characteristics, automatically adjusting stirring speed and valve opening.
Dispensing a wide variety
When your typical run requires you to dispense many different powders — for example a formulation screen — the Storage Vial (SV) hoppers are your best bet. These hoppers work with standard 4 mL glass vials that are outfitted with a disposable dispense head. You can fit dozens of vials on deck, and hundreds off deck. These small hoppers allow for greater flexibility in reagent or reaction screening and can also be tracked and used across multiple experimental runs.
Automated liquid dispensing
Whether you’re transferring thin buffers or sticky biologic formulations, Stuntman makes liquid handling consistent. Air Displacement Tips (ADTs) handle standard solutions, while Positive Displacement Tips (PDTs) take care of high-viscosity or shear-sensitive samples without loss or contamination. Each liquid type is individually calibrated, so every dispense hits the target — no drips, no bubbles, no surprises. Stuntman can also manage on-deck dilutions or pH titrations, preparing samples or formulations directly before testing.
Six-tip air displacement tips (ADT) dispense
For less viscous solutions, Stuntman uses the six-tip liquid transfer arm for automated sample preparation. It uses standard pipette tips from 50 -1000 µL capacity. The pitch is adjustable between 9 mm for standard plates and 20 mm, which is handy for larger vials. This capability allows for sample or plate reformatting. The use of syringe pumps for every tip means each can pick up different volumes if that’s what needs to happen. The tip pick up is also individually controlled so if your workflow needs to use just a few positions it can handle that too.
Positive displacement tips (PDT) dispense
Sometimes those standard plastic tips just aren’t good enough for your automated sample preparation needs. In that case, you can switch it up to use PDTs, which are more accurate and precise for higher viscosity solutions. The tool can dispense low volumes (10 – 1000 µL) or large volumes (100 µL – 10 mL) and are compatible with multiple PDT vendors. If you have a balance on your configured system, the tool can also monitor the dispense gravimetrically.
Sterile filtration
Maintaining sterility during sample prep is critical for biologics. Stuntman can be equipped with on-deck sterile filtration modules to clarify or sterilize solutions before aliquoting. Automated vacuum or pressure filtration removes particulates and microbial contaminants without manual transfers, protecting both sample integrity and operator safety. Whether you’re prepping protein formulations or viral vector solutions, automated sterile filtration keeps every sample clean, consistent, and contamination-free.
Temperature control
Temperature matters. Proteins denature and viral vectors lose potency fast at room temp. Stuntman’s temperature-controlled deck and chilled racks keep samples cold from the first dispense to the final seal. You can maintain controlled conditions across modules — from 4 °C to ambient — ensuring sensitive materials stay stable throughout prep. With active temperature monitoring and automation, cold-chain integrity is built into every step.
Sealing and containment
Once formulations are prepared, Stuntman automates vial capping and sealing to keep samples sterile and stable. Screw caps, stoppers, crimp caps, and septum seals are applied with precise torque and alignment for airtight, leak-free containment. For biologics, that means no evaporation, no contamination, and no broken seals during storage or transport. It’s consistent containment, every time.
When it’s time for analysis, Stuntman can also automate decrimping and destoppering, safely opening sealed vials without compromising sample integrity. That means samples can move directly from formulation or storage to analytical testing — cleanly, reproducibly, and without manual intervention.
Labeling and tracking
Keeping track of hundreds of samples across plates or vials can be a challenge. Stuntman can be equipped with labeling and tracking features that bring order to even the busiest decks. Each vial or plate can be barcoded and logged automatically, linking each aliquot back to its formulation batch automatically. This level of traceability ensures data integrity across large screens or multi-day runs — no mix-ups, no lost samples, and a complete audit trail when you need it.
Integrations
With Stuntman, the integrations and add-ons are endless. Use Stuntman’s built-in AI or Python API to connect with your own tools and data systems, or AI and machine learning platforms. Drop in modules that your workflow calls for or hook it up to third party systems for prep, processing or analysis. Keep expanding as your science evolves.
Stuntman
Stuntman has natural-language AI embedded directly into the system to help plan and design smarter experiments, close the loop faster, and adapt as conditions change, while hardware is configured upfront to fit your workflow. The result is faster iteration, more informative data, and automation that finally keeps pace with real science, whether you’re working in chemistry, biologics, materials, or beyond.
Want more info?
Every lab has different bottlenecks and challenges. We’re all about partnering with you to build the bespoke solution that lets you do science faster and better. Have questions or can’t wait to speak with our expert team to find out what might be possible?