在培养皿上生长的模型生物的表型通常手动进行,尽管程序费时费力。主要原因是自动化表型设施的可用性有限,而构建定制的自动化解决方案对于生物学家来说可能是一项艰巨的任务。这里,我们描述了SPIRO,智能板成像机器人,一个自动化平台,可在单个实验中获取多达四个垂直定向培养皿的延时照片,对应于典型的根生长测定的192个幼苗和发芽测定的2500个种子。SPIRO专门满足生物学家的需求,不需要工程或编程专业知识的组装和操作。其占地面积小,针对标准孵化器进行了优化,内置的绿色LED可以在黑暗条件下成像,和远程控制提供对数据的访问,而不会干扰样品的生长。SPIRO出色的图像质量适用于自动图像处理,我们在种子发芽和根生长测定的例子中证明了这一点。此外,机器人可以很容易地定制的特定用途,因为有关SPIRO的所有信息都是在开源许可证下发布的。重要的是,与手动测定相比,不间断成像可以更精确地评估种子发芽参数和根系生长速率。此外,SPIRO能够实现先前技术上具有挑战性的测定,例如在黑暗中进行表型分型。我们在概念验证实验中说明了SPIRO的好处,这些实验对自噬之间的相互作用产生了新的见解,氮传感,和成光反应。
Phenotyping of model organisms grown on Petri plates is often carried out manually, despite the procedures being time-consuming and laborious. The main reason for this is the limited availability of automated phenotyping facilities, whereas constructing a custom automated solution can be a daunting task for biologists. Here, we describe SPIRO, the Smart Plate Imaging Robot, an automated platform that acquires time-lapse photographs of up to four vertically oriented Petri plates in a single experiment, corresponding to 192 seedlings for a typical root growth assay and up to 2500 seeds for a germination assay. SPIRO is catered specifically to biologists\' needs, requiring no engineering or programming expertise for assembly and operation. Its small footprint is optimized for standard incubators, the inbuilt green LED enables imaging under dark conditions, and remote control provides access to the data without interfering with sample growth. SPIRO\'s excellent image quality is suitable for automated image processing, which we demonstrate on the example of seed germination and root growth assays. Furthermore, the robot can be easily customized for specific uses, as all information about SPIRO is released under open-source licenses. Importantly, uninterrupted imaging allows considerably more precise assessment of seed germination parameters and root growth rates compared with manual assays. Moreover, SPIRO enables previously technically challenging assays such as phenotyping in the dark. We illustrate the benefits of SPIRO in proof-of-concept experiments which yielded a novel insight on the interplay between autophagy, nitrogen sensing, and photoblastic response.