The Art of Correct Pipetting

“We speak the language of scientists and lab technicians”
The company offers both a wide range of standard courses and tailored training programs designed to meet a client’s specific needs. The courses, designed for lab workers who range from beginners to highly experienced professionals, are taught by experts who explore both the theoretical and practical aspects of their subjects. The courses are held preferably at the client’s place of business or in training locations across Germany. The company’s clients come primarily from the pharmaceutical industry and about 10% from university research organizations. Surprisingly, the courses are largely attended by researchers who have 10 to 20 years of professional experience and who want to learn particular methods. The single exception: cell-culture production These courses are frequently attended by very young people due to the higher rate of employee turnover. Dr. Kühl herself teaches the cell-culture courses, in particular the areas of aseptic and hygienic procedures, as well as the bioassay course that covers such fundamental topics as correct pipette selection and pipetting techniques. Highly experienced specialists teach the heavily demanded subject areas of optimization and troubleshooting of analytic methods like PCR, q-PCR, sequencing, NGS, ELISA development and, since 2020, coronavirus testing.

The key: Pipettes and pipette tips from a single source!
Selecting the correct pipette is one of Dr. Kühl’s passions, a fact that can be traced back to the beginnings of her consulting work on cell-based assays at several pharmaceutical companies. This work ultimately led to the development of her extremely popular bioassay course. She describes this work as an “amazingly mind-boggling example” of the repercussions that can arise if fundamental things like pipetting are not monitored. Such oversights can cause an entire experiment to fail – and these were certainly not isolated cases. Instrument quality also plays a significant role in lab work. Dr. Kühl swears by high-quality equipment made in Germany, including the pipettes and pipette tips produced by Eppendorf, a company that has been a true guardian angel for many of her customers. This is particularly the case in the selection of the correct pipette tip. Many companies use inexpensive tips in cell-based assays to lower costs. But companies doing this tend to overlook that pipettes and pipette tips are actually a homogeneous system that should be made by the same company in order to achieve the desired results. It is a fact of life that Dr. Kühl sees over and over again during her courses and consulting work.

Quality pays off, even for consumables
If you take a closer look at the manufacturing process Eppendorf uses to produce pipette tips , you will quickly understand why this is so: “I had a chance a few years ago to tour Eppendorf’s production halls in Oldenburg in Holstein,” Dr. Kühl says. “It was an incredibly fascinating experience. “I also had an opportunity to see how the company checks the quality of its pipette tips. Every tip is photographed with the help of a robot arm to determine whether the tip meets the company’s high quality standards. If a tip fails, it’s rejected and replaced by another tip.”Dr. Kühl remembers one customer success story in particular: “This was a quality-control consulting job at a major pharmaceutical company. The main focus involved the setup of a bioassay for the approval testing of a medication. The lab staff was highly experienced and had performed ELISA for years. But once they started to conduct their first cell-based assay, errors kept creeping up. We ultimately determined that they had not only selected the wrong plastic, but were also using ELISA-optimized pipetting techniques. With this knowledge in hand, the sources of the errors could be eliminated and the assay successfully conducted.”

Just how good is your knowledge about selecting the correct pipetting solution and your pipetting technique? Are you simply a rookie or a seasoned pipetting pro?

Use our selection chart to size yourself up or check out our how-to videos and pipetting tips on Eppendorf’s YouTube channel .

You will become a true pipetting master in no time at all when you do this!