Comprehensive web-based broker for bio-technology design and manufacturing

Synthetic biology, particularly in relation to characterisation experiments relating to the description of bio-parts frequently involves the use of a wide range of equipment, including, for example, plate reader's, flow cytometers, and mass spectrometers. This equipment is often from multiple manufacturers. The study describes broker technology that has been developed which has the ability to connect multiple types of equipment into a common information environment; the connectivity from the databases and equipment is achieved using Visbion's ‘cube’ technology that involves military specification encryption for data security. The broker technology uses a new, developing standard, Digital Imaging and Communication in Medicine (DICOM)-SB, that is based on the highly successful international standard for biomedicine, DICOM. The broker uses a version of the DICOM data model that has been specifically designed for synthetic biology and, in particular, characterisation data.