A Novel System for Semiautomatic Sample Processing in Chronic Myeloid Leukaemia: Increasing Throughput without Impacting on Molecular Monitoring at Time of SARS-CoV-2 Pandemic

Molecular testing of the BCR-ABL1 transcript via real-time quantitative-polymerase-chain-reaction is the most sensitive approach for monitoring the response to tyrosine-kinase-inhibitors therapy in chronic myeloid leukaemia (CML) patients. Each stage of the molecular procedure has been standardized and optimized, including the total white blood cells (WBCs) and RNA isolation methods. Here, we compare the performance of our current manual protocol to a newly semiautomatic method based on the Biomek i-5 Automated Workstations integrated with the CytoFLEX Flow Cytometer, followed by the automatic QIAsymphony system to facilitate high-throughput processing samples and reduce the hands-on time and the risk associated with SARS-CoV-2. The recovery efficiency was investigated in blood samples from 100 adults with CML. We observe a 100% of concordance between the two methods, with similar total WBCs isolated (median 1.137 × 106 for manual method vs. 1.076 × 106 for semiautomatic system) and a comparable quality and quantity of RNA extracted (median 103 ng/μL with manual isolation kit vs. 99.95 ng/μL with the QIAsymphony system). Moreover, by stratifying patients according to their BCR-ABL1 transcript levels, we obtained similar BCR-ABL1/ABL1IS values and ABL1 copies, and matched samples were assigned to the same group of molecular response. We conclude that this newly semiautomatic workflow has a performance comparable to our more laborious standard manual, which can be replaced, particularly when specimens from patients with suspected or confirmed SARS-CoV-2 infection need to be processed.

IDENTIFICATION OF THE HONEYBEE SUBSPECIES FROM SOME ROMANIAN COUNTIES USING A SEMIAUTOMATIC SYSTEM FOR ANALYZING WINGS

Morphometric analysis of honeybee wings can be used to discriminate between honeybee subspecies. The classic morphometric methods used to identify honeybee subspecies are time consuming while geometric morphometric analysis are proven to be more efficient and rapid for the identification of honeybee subspecies. Even if the geometric morphometric analysis involves several steps such as: obtaining the image of the honeybee wing, processing the wings image (settlement of the 19 points), classification and validation, in terms of consumed time,it takes less than classic morphometric methodes and it is easier to apply. The aim of this study was to identify honeybee subspecies from the Romanian South-Eastern area, using the geometric morphometric method. To accomplish this, the semiautomated French system ApiClass was used. This system allows us to identify the honeybee subspecies based on the wing's image of the Apis mellifera honeybee worker. The program is using the recent approaches of geometric morphometry and is analyzing the wing considering 19 points corresponding to the intersections of the main veins of the bee forewings. These coordinates are processed by the system before being analyzed after which the system returns the probability of the analyzed honeybee belonging to one of the honeybee subspecies from its reference system. The system has more than 5000 honeybee wing references off the main lines and honeybee subspecies. Using this system we analyzed samples from the counties of Braila, Buzau, Galati and Ilfov. Each sample was composed from wings of 20 honeybees. Most of the analyzed samples were identified as hybrids without being possible to specify the type or the level of the hybridization: only three samples were identified as being Apis mellifera carnica presenting a homology degree over 90%.

Wireless Communication Technique Applied to Coal-Transport System

The traditional coal-transport system for the power plant is a semiautomatic system based on relay and manual way.The belt is often deviated and ripped due to the large range of coal-transport system.There are interpreted the function of wireless telecontrol used on coal-transport system , the system building up and the radio information for applying this technique.