Bio-manipulation with a robotic straw

In this paper, we demonstrate the usefulness of the micro-manipulation system with a robotic straw proposed by the authors for the microorganism isolation task. Isolating microorganism is one of the fundamental bio-manipulation tasks. This task has been conventionally achieved with a straw connected with a rubber tube. However, some skill is required by an operator for this isolation task, because it is difficult for a naive operator to place the tip of pipette at a desired position under a microscope. We show that the microorganism isolation task is successfully achieved with the proposed system even by a naive operator of the conventional microorganism isolation task without long-term training.