Toby Winchester

Welcome, everybody, this is another episode of the Voices of Sample Management. Thank you for joining. 

Today, I have a fellow product manager. Matt, could you introduce yourself?

Matt Peel

Hi Toby, hi, everyone, thanks for that. 

So, yes, as Toby says, I'm a product manager here at Titian. I started my career as a software developer. I started at IBM, worked there for about six years before moving to Titian Software, also as a software developer. 

So, worked on many product changes, seen the product grow. 

I've been at Titian for now, 13 years, I think, so I was a developer, then I became team leader and project manager. 

So leading the development team through a number of different in-house products. and then in the last few months, I joined the product management team.

Toby Winchester

Cool, thank you. 

Today's topic is when and why do you need requesting in your inventory management system? 

We’ll be going through the why do you need it, and also, you know, the things you should be asking of your inventory management system, thinking about what you need if you're purchasing or asking for upgrades.

So, I suppose let's start with, you know, inventory management, that's all about finding things in freezers and what the concentration of a tube is, etc.. 

Why do you need an ordering system on top of that, Matt?

Matt Peel

Okay. So when we're talking about inventory management, obviously it's keeping a database of everything that you've got in the system. 

What labware it’s in, normally tracked by barcode, and having an inventory search to be able to find the substances you want to be able to view what's available in the system, the amounts and concentrations of everything with the aim of being able to find the samples that you're looking for in store and be able to pick them.

And that sort of self-service model can be fine, but it's not very scalable. 

As soon as you are in a situation where you might have multiple different stores, different freezers dotted around the place, the samples might be…  you might have many, many instances of the same substance again dotted around that could be in different forms.

So, solution or neat, you might need to solubilise them, you might need to take aliquots from those samples. 

You might want to create plates. 

There's a lot of process involved there. There's also the decision making about exactly which sample to use when you've got a choice to make, all those sort of decisions.

It sort of distracts the scientist from their day job, and really they just want to say, “I want this substance and I want it in a in a particular format, and I want it delivered to me. I don't want to have to worry about the logistics of preparing the sample.” 

So that's where a centralised sample bank can really help with efficiency and with scaling.

So, you have an ordering system that allows the scientist to say what they want. 

And then, the ordering system will do all the calculations for you, working out what the best sample for your need is and what the processes are that are going to need to be done on that sample.

And then, the staff in the sample bank, who are experts in using the lab equipment, can then go and compare those samples for you.

And then just deliver to the scientist exactly as required without any of that effort being put on the scientist. 

Toby Winchester

Okay. Cool. Thank you.

So, yeah. So I suppose we're talking requesting. So you basically got a blackbox sample management and, you know, scientists wanting to run assays etc. 

Yeah, but they want to concentrate on the science, is basically what you're suggesting, rather than coping with all the logistics of maybe shipping items around the world and running liquid handlers etc., being experts in that, that’s diluting their scientific input, I suppose.

So, that's why we see lots of requesting tools out there. 

What sorts of requesting are there? You've already talked about barcodes, so I suspect a by barcode request, this is fairly simple?

Matt Peel

Yeah. So, sometimes you just want to say the substance that you need and that’s all. But sometimes, for example, if you're doing a follow up or you want to use exactly the same sources as used previously, so being able to order by barcode can be useful.

Sometimes you might have, your inventory tool, kind of, logic in it to suggest a specific barcode and then you want to, to order that.

So having the flexibility to be able to choose how you order, either by substance or by barcode can be, really, really useful.

Toby Winchester

Yeah, and I suppose the scientist usually only cares about the substance, unless there's a critical reason of why you need to go back to the same tube to, you know, maybe run an n of 2 or an n of 3 from the same source. 

Yeah, so you know, by substance. Yeah. Is a further complication there, I suppose…

Is it close by? Is it in your freezer in your lab? Is it halfway around the world in China or somewhere? 

What things need to go into a calculation if you've got a by substance, but you may have more than one sample of that substance. For instance, tube or plate or neat or…

Ten millimolar concentration, one millimolar concentration. So, yeah. What sort of issues does the requesting tool need to cope with there?

Matt Peel

So, it needs to see what's available. So obviously if the sample isn’t in the concentration or the form that you're looking for, it needs to work out what it needs to convert that availability to what you're asking for. 

So it might do some calculations there of a dilution, it's going to calculate whether somebody else might have already put a request in, on the same sample of the same substance, make sure there's no overlap between requests and so gracefully decide who gets what, without any conflict, that sort of thing.

Toby Winchester

So almost like a hotel reservation, you can't both have the same rooms or that sort of thing, 

Matt Peel

Yeah, that sort of thing.

Toby Winchester

Right, yeah, okay. 

So yeah, I suppose, reservations, but it's also potentially the process may not just be I want a tube of this item, this substance, it might be you want something more complicated, such as a, worst case, an echo dose response plate, or even worse, maybe a pooled plate with multiple mixtures in every well. 

So, how does the requesting tool have to cope with those sorts of things?

Matt Peel 

So it needs to know that if there's a complicated workflow involved, maybe, possibly multi steps via intermediates, all of that needs to be built into the system so that if the end user only really cares about what the plate they're going to get out of it at the end. But that might hide a lot of complexity.

Different machines need to be used, different types of labware involved. 

All of that, the system needs to understand that and be able to work out, you know, what machines are available and… what processes are needed for that, and yet somehow have all that logic built into it.

Toby Winchester 

Okay. And, you know, I suppose let's talk about one of those workflows. It could be as simple as going from a tube to a tube. Maybe it's a vial of neat small molecule and you've got to get it into a, you know, automation compatible system. 

You know, what sort of things have to exist in that workflow?

I'm guessing, you know, is there enough of the neat in order to make the right volume of solution? 

Matt Peel

Yeah. If it’s neats, we kind of have to work out how much solution can be created from that.

If there's too much neat, then it's going to have to calculate how much is going to be weighed out. So there might be a dispense done first into another tube, which is then solubilised to the right concentration, but probably for higher volume than you're going to need.

So the system then has to work out how much needs to be cherry picked from that initial tube into a sample plate, or there might be an intermediate plate. 

So if you're using an Echo, which has a very small amounts, you might have to do an initial cherry pick into to a higher volume plate. 

And then that will then be the source for using on the Echo. So a lot of steps there.

Toby Winchester

So I suppose this is all sounding really quite complicated for the poor requestor if they’ve got to figure out, you know, this the entire workflow, if they’ve got to understand the workflow in order to make this happen.

Matt Peel

Well no, so that's where a good software system will do all that for you. 

And so basically the requestor will put that request into the system. The system will work out what, or sort of know what workflows are possible and what steps are needed, and automatically create the workflow that matches the request. 

So, it should come up with a step-by-step process of everything that needs to be done to fulfill that request. 

And then someone in the sample bank can see that workflow and be guided through it step-by-step, not having to do any calculations themselves, just being basically guided through how much and what samples they need to bring where, it can be as simple as then just taking that effort  away from the sample bank staff.

Toby Winchester

Okay. And I suppose stopping them making mistakes as well, that's exactly the same.

Matt Peel

It’s the sort of human error that can creep in, if you're having to do those sort of calculations.

Toby Winchester

On a post-it note or something like that… I've never seen it done before. My time at Pfizer, never. 

So, I suppose, you know, science moves on. We've talked about simple dose response type work, and even single point, you know, I've got a plate of 96 individual substances, all at the same concentration, but it can get a bit more complicated than that, can't it?

With, you know, move to mixtures and pooling. How does ordering cope, how does the request system cope with that?

Matt Peel

Well, so you need to be able to request… the substances you’re requesting need to be able to specify which ones are going to be pulled together in the final output.

So you need to have a system that not only lets you list the substances that you want, but also how they can be mixed together.

And give you some way for the requestor to specify which substances are going to be going into what mixture.

Toby Winchester

Okay. And the, yeah, it's almost sounding like, you know, a request system could be really quite simple. I mean, I'm thinking, you know, when I go on my phone and use a certain, river based software, on it to order items, you can get a long list of, you know, curtain rails or whatever it might be or what you're looking for, but it's really quite simple to order.

But I suppose in some cases, mixtures creation, you might have a, you know, a more complex order than just, you know, your river based ordering system if you like, can you explain, is there potentially two types of ordering?

Matt Peel

Yeah. So again it's about flexibility. So, as you suggest, the majority of people using a requesting system will probably do things in the most simple way. 

Just add their items and click go. 

But a good system will have the flexibility to allow for the more complexity of mixtures being one of them. So, essentially it's a system that's as complex as it needs to be.

But no more than that.

So for some advanced users there should  be those advanced options. But for anyone who doesn't care about those advanced options, then that thing should be as simple as possible. 

Toby Winchester

Okay, so, I mean, you've you've talked about a list of items that somebody wants to order. 

What happens if, you know, I'm thinking a project scientist may have very few, you know, unfortunately, you know, especially in the small molecule world, there may not be many items coming in through per week, but they want to send them to more than one assay.

Do they have to do, you know, ten requests in order to make that happen?

Matt Peel

Again, that should be something that the flexibility of the system allows you to have an interface for doing that. 

So that's a common scenario that a requestor would want to do. 

So the system should have an interface for that sort of assay requesting. 

So yeah, you shouldn't have to be forced to to put in keep putting in multiple requests if you want to have the same set of substances for more than one assay, it should allow you to have an interface that will, simply and efficiently pick the from a list of assays, which ones you want, which substances to be submitted for.

Toby Winchester

Okay. Cool. and then I suppose,

How confident should the requestor be that they're going to get their items, their mixtures plate?

Matt Peel

Yeah. I mean they should be completely confident that once they put that request into the system, that the system should run an upfront check, to make sure that what they're asking for is fulfilable.

And once the system is given the green light, the requestor should have full confidence that what they've asked for is what's going to be delivered.

And obviously, if what they're asking for can't be achieved, then they should be told that up front as well. 

They shouldn't have to wait hours or days and then be told that, “sorry, there was a problem with your order.” 

They should be told straight away, and then they can make the necessary adjustments, if they can, to order something different or different amounts.

Toby Winchester

Okay. And then, I suppose another awful scenario might be where, you know, project X doesn't want project Y to use Project X’s substances for the first six months or something like that. 

Because they've been bought, designed for project X, there's a restriction system maybe existing as well...

Matt Peel

Yeah. So again, that should be a functionality of the system that you can place restrictions on certain substances or labware items and say that these are reserved for a particular user or set of users. 

And then the system will know that if somebody else tries to order those, then it should let them know that they can't do that.

But they should also know that if someone who is allowed access, they should have access straightaway, there shouldn't be any kind of wrangling needed. They should just get what they want.

Toby Winchester

What they require. Yes. Okay.

I suppose that one of the nightmares with restrictions might be, you know, the owner of that substance leaves the company or moves department or something like that, right? 

Yeah. That's another can of worms. 

I suppose, you know, a company may have their own interface that they’re used to using, you know, maybe it's an ELN or something like that.

Does the requesting system need to operate with other systems?

Matt Peel

Yeah. So that's fairly standard for requesting systems to have an API, a web service that other systems can call. 

So, that yeah, just as you described, a requestor can use a system that they’re familiar with to put a request in and then that gets sent along to the sample bank’s requesting systems seamlessly from the requestor’s point of view.

And the request will just get put into the sample bank exactly as if the requestor had used the user interface directly.

Toby Winchester

Okay. And then, I suppose downstream of these requests, you know, is there focus on making the sample bank as efficient as possible?

Within the labs, such as, maybe you have an automated store and everything gets picked for the day's work before anybody even arrives in the, you know, is that important as well?

Matt Peel

Yeah. So obviously if multiple requestors are using the system and putting multiple requests in  for similar substances and similar workflows, you don't want the sample bank staff to be continuously going to the store to pick just a few items and then running just a small number of samples on a liquid handler just to create a small number of plates.

You want the system to be able to bring all the similar work together. 

And show the operator that you've got a lot of different requests that need to be operated on today. So basically, all the picking can be done for multiple requests in one go to get all the samples ready.

And yeah, if you're using an automated store, that could be done overnight. So, in the morning the staff could come straight away, all their samples will be ready.

The system will tell them exactly what needs to be done with those samples. And, they can all be done on the same machine, maybe in a single run, so that the machine utilsation is as efficient as possible.

Toby Winchester

So you mean more than one request could be done on one machine? And on a single run…

Matt Peel 

Based on the machine and they're doing similar processes, then yes, it makes sense to do them at the same time.

Toby Winchester

Okay. And then hence the sample management staff can have a longer coffee break. I like that one.

I suppose, you know, we've talked about consolidation, maybe from an auto store, even from a manual store, I suppose. But, consolidation of the liquid handlers, what about consolidation, you know, we were talking earlier about, you know, multiple projects may be asking for an assay, is there any consolidation that can happen there as well?

Matt Peel

Yeah, so again, if multiple people are requesting substances of the same set of assays, you don't want to be creating sparsely populated plates, multiple sparsely populated plates for the same assay, the sample bank staff want to be able to see that all the requestors that have requested for that assay and be able to pool the work together and create consolidated plates, as many full plates as you can and then send all of those in one go to the to the assayist.

Toby Winchester

Okay. So, and I suppose you know, even better, you know, that doesn't just consolidate sample bank’s time, that consolidates the assayists running the assay, and then they don't have ten plates, they have one plate to run. 

Matt Peel

Yeah, exactly

Toby Winchester

Excellent. Okay. 

Is there anything else you want to bring up or is that all we can think about for a request, the requesting system.

Matt Peel

I think we’ve covered everything there.  

Toby Winchester

Okay. Cool. So, yeah, I suppose the take home message is, you know, make sure your requesting system can cope with what you're currently doing and what you need to do in the future, potentially you need to do in the future. 

We as Titian see different systems out there. They all have their plusses and minuses.

But, you know, the sort of things we've discussed here are probably the questions you should be asking when you decide to, either in-house design the requesting system or purchase one.

So I hope this has helped with why requesting is so important. 

Matt, thank you for your time, and thank you, everybody, for listening into the latest Voices of Sample Management.

Both

Thank you.