engineering

Opentrons

Opentrons is a engineering topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Opentrons rather than just read about it. In short: Opentrons Labworks, Inc. (or Opentrons) is a biotechnology company that manufactures liquid handling robots that use open-source software, which at one point used open-source hardware but no longer does.

Key takeaways

Opentrons belongs to engineering; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Opentrons to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Opentrons from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Opentrons Labworks, Inc. (or Opentrons) is a biotechnology company that manufactures liquid handling robots that use open-source software, which at one point used open-source hardware but no longer does. Their robots can be used by scientists to manipulate small volumes of liquids for the purpose of undertaking biochemical or chemical reactions. Currently, they offer the OT-2 and Flex robots. These robots are used primarily by researchers and scientists interested in DIY biology, but they are increasingly being used by other biologists.

Products Current:

OT-2 – The OT-2 was released in 2018 and has seen utilization as one of the tools that researchers are leveraging in the fight against COVID-19. The OT-2 and later products, including its electronic micropipettes and hardware modules, are closed source (proprietary) hardware. Only coarse CAD files for the enclosure have been released, with no details on the internals, such that it no longer complies with current open hardware standards. The software remains open source. Flex – Successor to the OT-2, the Flex was released in 2023, "measures two feet by two feet by two feet", and is purchased with a one-time cost rather than a robot as a service (RaaS) subscription. Its open-source and accessible API allows it to interact with potential AI tools. Flex Prep – Similar to the Flex, the Flex Prep was released in 2024 and provides a no-code software for setting up pipetting tasks and executing that workflow through the Flex Prep touchscreen. Discontinued:

OT-1 – The OpenTrons OT-1 was the result of a crowdfunding campaign on the Kickstarter platform and was released in 2015 for $2,000. This robot employed adapters to actuate handheld micropipettes. The release of the OT-1 marked the first commercial open source liquid handling robot in the life science industry. It was also the last in the series to adhere to open hardware standards, however, editable CAD files were not released. It is no longer commercially available, though at least one replication was attempted.

History The company originated from Genspace, a community biology laboratory in Brooklyn, New York. Will Canine, a biohacker and former Occupy Wall Street organizer, partnered with Nicholas Wagner and Chiu Chau as his eventual co-founders who he found from a DIY-bio listserve. In 2014, the startup officially launched with financial backing from HAXLR8TR, a hardware accelerator in Shenzhen, China. In late 2014, they launch a Kickstarter campaign. They show their machine inserting DNA inside E. coli after their campaign successfully gets funded. Jonathan Brennan-Badal, who was VP of strategy at ComiXology and a board member of Genspace, joined Opentrons in 2014 and is the current CEO. In 2016, Opentrons was part of Y Combinator's Winter cohort of startups.

Impact Opentrons robots have had a variety of uses in the scientific and DIY community. Scientists at UCSD modified an existing OT-1 robot to automate adding in reagents and imaging their cell signaling experiments. Scientists at Carnegie Mellon University used the OT-2, Opentrons Python API, and OpenAI's GPT-4 to autonomously design, plan, and perform experiments. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Opentrons helped set up the Pandemic Response Lab (PRL), a sequencing facility located in Queens, New York. Opentrons' robots at the PRL helped speed up turnaround time for COVID-19 testing, going from 7 to 14 days to 12 hours, and reducing costs from $2,000 to under $28. Institutions that made use of Opentrons' robots for COVID-19 testing include: Mayo Clinic, Harvard, Stanford, Caltech, MIT, and BioNTech.

Subsidiaries As a company, Opentrons has a number of subsidiaries.

Opentrons Robotics – business unit for user-friendly lab automation Pandemic Response Lab (PRL) – in partnership with NYU Langone Health, provides diagnostic lab services to health systems across the US, and as of December 31, 2022 has shut down Neochromosome (Neo) – acquired in March 2021, Neo creates genome-scale cell engineering solutions for therapeutics Zenith AI – acquired in June 2021, Zenith AI brings no-code AI and modern machine learning to the platform

See also Laboratory automation Liquid handling robot List of biotech and pharmaceutical companies in the New York metropolitan area

References

External links Opentrons' Y Combinator profile Opentrons' GitHub organization page

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Opentrons

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Opentrons claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In engineering, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Opentrons before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Opentrons ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Opentrons

In research: Opentrons appears in engineering research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Opentrons in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Opentrons is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Biotechnology companies, Companies based in Queens, New York, Laboratory robots, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Opentrons outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Opentrons in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Opentrons means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Opentrons out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Opentrons in simple terms?

Why does Opentrons matter?

Because it connects several engineering ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Opentrons?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Opentrons.