The Plate Registration (Plate Map Groups) tool allows users to register plates from plate map groups created using the Create Plate Map tool. After selecting plate maps, and specifying a plate type, users have the option of setting plate-wide volumes or uploading a CSV of specific plate wells' volumes (download example file for formatting guidance).
Input: Selection of plate map groups
Output: A registered plate for each selected plate map
You can find more detailed definitions of the terms mentioned in this article in the glossary.
Prerequisites:
This tool uses Plate Map Groups as inputs, so they should be created before using this tool.
You can find the ‘Plate Registration (Plate Map Groups)’ tool under Tools > Tool Library. Click on the tool name at the left sidebar and then press ‘Launch Tool’ to start using the tool.
The tool will walk you through several steps. You need to complete each step before proceeding to the next. After completing a step, the completed step mark (circle) will turn green with a checkmark. You can always use the ‘previous’ button to go back to any previous step.
1. Select Plate Map Groups: Click on 'Select Plate Map Groups' to look for the information you want to use to create new plates:
A list of Plate Map Groups elements will appear containing a checkbox on each element. Click on each of the rows with the names of the Plate Map Groups you want to apply. You may also use the search bar at the upper right corner to filter the displayed elements by name. After you have done with selection click on 'Select Plate Map Groups'. In the example shown below we searched for 'PCR' and selected the 'PCR materials' Plate Map Group.
After selecting Plate Map Groups, the Step 1 interface displays the selected elements. You can remove selected elements by pressing the trash can icon on each row. You may also modify your selection by pressing 'Change Plate Map Groups'. Click on 'Next' button when you are finished.
2. Select Plate Format: This tool will help you create all the plate maps defined on each Plate Map Group you selected in the previous step. In our current example, we just have 1 plate defined for the 'PCR materials' group, as shown on the image below. This screenshot, which displays the top half of the 'Select Plate Format' screen, also shows the text field where you should name each of the plates. In the current example we used 'PCR Example 1'.
Under the 'Plate Type' column header, there's a selector element that allows you to specify the type for each plate. This selector will show you only the types that are compatible with the format previously specified for that particular plate map. Within our example, it only shows 4 available options.
On the bottom down half of the screen you will find a tool for specifying the material quantities for each plate. You can select 'plate-wide', which means applying the same values to all wells, or individually for each plate. You can also select volume and concentration if you are working with liquid solutions or mass for dry plates. At the image below we chose a plate-wide volume of 1 uL and a concentration of 3 ng/uL
If you want to specify quantities for each well individually, select the 'Upload well volume and concentration (or mass) CSV' radio button. Then, click or drag the file, with your well contents, to be uploaded. If you haven't created a file you may download the template csv, which will be generated for you to fit your specified plate type. Here, each row represents a well and you'll just need to fill the contents for each well using the volume, volume unit, concentration, concentration unit (or molarity and molarity Unit) columns on wells with liquid solutions or mass and mass unit on dry wells.
3. Register Plate Barcodes: This last step allows you to link a barcode to the new plates. You may select the 'Generate Barcodes' checkbox (default) if you want to automatically generate new barcodes for the new plates or alternatively you may deselect this checkbox and fill the barcodes manually for each new plate. In the example shown below we set the barcode '123456789' to our new plate:
Click on 'Register Plates' when finished. A 'successful completion' message should be shown afterwards. You may press the blue text link with the number of created plates to see the new elements
