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Pipette Drift Sources and Solutions for Patch Clamp Recording Experiments

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Pipette Drift Sources and Solutions for Patch Clamp Recording Experiments

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Negligible pipette position drift is a critical requirement of most patch clamp recording experiments. In a typical experiment this is less than one micrometer (10-6 meters) per hour. When mechanical systems are used on the micrometer scale, physical phenomena that normally can be ignored at other resolutions become very significant. These phenomena include thermal expansion, mechanical stiffness, dynamic forces and deflection. As a world leader in ultra-precise mechanical systems, EXFO Burleigh Products Group (formerly Burleigh Instruments) has pushed the limits of stability with its solid-state piezoelectric micromanipulator systems. Regardless, the entire mechanical system, not just the micromanipulator, must be taken into consideration when evaluating drift in patch clamp recording experiments. In recent tests we analyzed some of the factors that cause drift including pipette/pipette holder materials, environmental changes and cable forces.

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