Application
High-Throughput Screening with Droplet Microfluidics
From droplets to hits – one integrated workflow
Onyx and Styx form a complete droplet microfluidics solution for high-throughput screening. Encapsulate your variant library, run your assay at scale, and sort enriched hits – all within a single, open ecosystem built around your assay, your conditions, and your lab.
HIGH-THROUGHPUT SCREENING Workflow
Millions of assays generated and sorted per session – processes in hours that would take days or weeks by plate-based methods.
Applications
STRAIN ENGINEERING
Conventional screening methods capture a fraction of the variant space – leaving most of the library untested. Onyx and Styx let you screen millions of microbial variants in a single session, identifying top performers by enzyme activity, metabolite production, or growth rate before committing to further development rounds.
PROTEIN ENGINEERING
Binding affinity alone does not predict functional performance. Droplet-based functional assays let you screen large protein libraries based on what your variants actually do in their biological context (activity, selectivity, stability), accelerating identification of the candidates worth taking forward.
CUSTOM SCREENING WORKFLOWS
From early assay development to high-throughput selection – Onyx and Styx support every stage. Bring your own chips, your own buffers, your own assay conditions. The platform adapts to your biology.
Two platforms Full workflow
Generate &
Manipulate
- Monodisperse droplet generation – 10 µL to 50 mL sample volume
- High‑speed microscopy: up to 4,000 fps – real‑time occupancy, quality, and uniformity analysis
- Pico‑injection and droplet merging – integrated forcefield generator
- 4 independent syringe pumps – 0.5 µL/h to 0.5 L/h flow range
- No chip lock‑in – compatible with commercial and custom PDMS chips
- Compatible with any optically transparent buffer or media
- Embedded UI software – full platform control and real‑time monitoring; no installation required
- Compact and mobile – operates in LAF hoods, cold rooms, clean rooms, and anoxic chambers
Sort &
Enrich
- Sorting rate: up to 1,000 Hz
- 4 lasers: 405 / 488 / 561 / 637 nm
- 4 independent fluorescence detection channels
- Multiparametric FADS: polygonal gating, subgating, signal duration, mean/peak sorting
- Dual high‑speed microscopy (1080p) – sort junction and outlet imaging
- Integrated high-voltage generator – 2 independent channels
- No chip lock‑in – compatible with commercial and custom PDMS chips
- Embedded UI software – intuitive sorting control, real‑time bleedthrough correction, and sort verification; no installation required
In applications like cell line development, maintaining genetic consistency requires each line to originate from a single-cell progenitor. However, droplets with selected cells are typically collected in bulk, complicating single-cell isolation.
To overcome this challenge, we've partnered with Seed Biosciences to enable precise transfer of selected cells from droplets into microwell plates for individual cultivation.
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