Hitachi-High-Technologies Corporation

Hitachi High-Tech Corporation

Toshiyuki Shimamori

Akihisa Makino

Masato Ishizawa

Mitsuhiro Hishinuma

Chie Yabutani

Nobuhiko Sasaki

Takanori Sawada

A chemical dispensing mechanism detects the liquid surface of a chemical including a chemical container mounted on a chemical disk. A calculation control unit controls the operation of the chemical dispensing mechanism. The calculation control unit performs a first raising operation, in which a chemical stored in the chemical container is suctioned by the chemical dispensing mechanism, which is then raised up to a first bubble detection position, determines whether a liquid surface is present, and outputs an alert indicating the presence of a bubble on the liquid surface when the liquid surface has been determined to be absent. The first bubble detection position is when the tip of a dispensing nozzle of the chemical dispensing mechanism remains inside the liquid when there are no bubbles present on the liquid surface, and is exposed from the inside of the liquid when there are bubbles present on the liquid surface.

Automatic analysis system

An automatic analyzer with high processing capacity is capable of immediately measuring an emergency specimen rack. The automatic analyzer includes a conveying line for conveying a specimen rack, and an analysis unit which has a dispensing line in which a plurality of specimen racks are arranged for waiting until sample dispensing, and a sampling area for dispensing the sample to the analysis unit. A rack save area is provided in the dispensing line and at a position adjacent to the upstream side of the sampling area. When a specimen rack exists in the sampling area at the time of measuring an emergency specimen rack, a controller moves the specimen rack to the save area and positions the emergency specimen rack to be moved from a downstream side of the sampling area to the sampling area.

Automatic analyzer

If an air bubble is entrained when a reagent is added to a sample, disturbance caused by this air bubble may prevent accurate optical measurement, thereby reducing accuracy for measuring blood clotting ability. The position to dispense the reagent depends on accuracy of stopping a reagent dispensing mechanism and dimensional errors of individual detectors, and thus conventional reagent discharging method may entrain an air bubble because a distance between a nozzle for dispensing the reagent and an inner wall of a reaction vessel is not constant and conditions for dispensing the reagent to the sample vary. In the present invention, an automatic analyzer with a nozzle for sucking and discharging the reagent for blood clotting reaction is provided with a dispensing mechanism that keeps a constant position for the nozzle to discharge the reagent by pressing the nozzle against the inner wall of the reaction vessel within the elastic range.

Growing community of inventors

Tokyo, Japan

Toshiyuki Shimamori