Fully unattended, automaed reaction preparation for polymerization screening with liquefied monomers which eliminates the handling of hazardous chemicals and increases the experimental quality.

• Decrease in cost per sample up to 90+ %.
• Increase in productivity by a factor of 10+.
• Volumetric (gravimetrically controlled) liquefied monomers dispensing (e.g. butadiene, isoprene, solvents and metalorganics) into different disposable reactor formats.
• 4-Needle Head for volumetric liquid handling and sampling.
• Ventilated hood for inert atmosphere.
• Dispensed amount, temperature, time..., and other data are stored in a read only log file.
• Easy access to data with a convenient interface to pull results into Excel or virtually any other software.
• Interface to DOE.

A typical workflow involves addition of solvent(s), additive(s) and monomer(s). These compounds are located in reservoirs outside the platform or in bottles on the tray. All steps involving liquid handling can be performed in an automated fashion, as well as the inertisation of the atmosphere inside the platform.
In this context, implementation of gloves and an air lock creates a glove-box type system, and so the user can remove the filled reactor vessels and introduce empty ones to run a new sequence without the need of re-doing the full inertisation of the whole chamber. Real-time monitoring of the weight of the reservoir bottles outside the platform provides additional control on quantities dispensed, as well as a safety trigger to stop the application in case a reservoir is empty.
In order to prevent liquid gas loss, vials or reactors are sealed with e.g. crimp caps with thick septa. Filling closed reactors with these thick septas is a challenging task. For the dispense of liquids, this problem can be solved by using a proprietary Double-Piercing Needle Technology. On the other hand, when liquefied gases such as butadiene need to be dispensed, our high-pressure liquid-handling system needs to be used. In both cases combined with a balance for weight counter checking. A reactor vessel filled in such a way can then be used for polymerisation screening tests at medium pressure and at high temperature, without any leaking from the septa.

Chemspeed’s SWING LIQUID GAS RP deck modularity allows the user to execute and perform a variety of polymerization screening workflows in a fully automated fashion.

• Gravimetric or volumetric dispensing of monomers such as butadiene, isoprene, and styrene into disposable reactors.
• Gravimetric or volumetric dispensing of solvents and metalorganics into disposable reactors.
• Flexible accomodation to different solvents, metalorganics, and monomers.
• Flexible accomodation to different disposable reactor formats.
• Self-contained working environment with glove-box, air-lock, O2 and CHx monitoring for safety and inert atmosphere.

• Suitable for piercing extremely thick septa.
• Piercing tip opens channel for standard needle to go through and perform liquid dispense.
• Pressure equilibration occurs between piercing tip and needle.
• Piercing tip does not damage septa: reactions can be conducted under pressure with no leakage.

Volumetric dispensing and aspiration of liquids is done with a Multi-Channel Liquid Handling Tool (4-Needle Head), with four independent needles. The four needles can be operated simultaneously or individually. If required the tool can be equipped with needles of different inner diameters. Larger diameter needles for the handling of suspensions or liquids with higher viscosities, smaller diameter needles for handling of small volumes.