Thermo Scientific's Ascent Software has been designed to power all microplate instruments belonging to the Ascent family, including our fluorometers, luminometer, nephelometer and photometers. The familiar Ascent software user interface is always the same, regardless of which instrument you are using.
Ascent Software can be used with the following instruments:
Ascent Software is divided into two desktops. The Procedure Desktop controls the instruments and allows basically limitless assay setup according to the users needs. In the uncommonly flexible Results Desktop, measurement data is reduced, results calculated and reports created using the powerful built in calculations in Ascent Software.
Procedure Desktop
The highly visual Procedure desktop in Ascent Software is used for instrument control and assay setup. When setting up an assay, the user can choose between a wide variety of plate formats. Ascent Software enables the measurement of 1 – 384 well plates, petri dishes and PCR tubes from different manufacturers (depending on the instrument). The template editor in Ascent software also allows easy addition of any new plate into the extensive template database. In the Area definition window in the Procedure desktop, the desired measurement area can be freely chosen by painting the wells to be measured. If needed, only half of the plate can be measured or even just every second row or column. Several measurement points can be taken from the same well when 1-48 well plates are used.
After defining the measurement area, sample information can be entered using the Layout editor. Calibrators with different concentrations and samples with different dilutions can be added automatically to the layout. Also controls and blanks can be defined to the layout. For clarity, colors can be assigned to the different specimen. The layout editor also allows loading of Sample ID’s from other systems into the layout.
The possibility to incorporate up to 99 different actions within any assay gives the user limitless flexibility in assay development. Ascent software enables 80 measurements within the same assay! To add steps or different actions to the assay, the step needed is dragged and dropped from the step menu or the shortcut buttons to the steplist. The following actions or steps are available (depending on the instrument): Measure, Incubate, Shake, Dispense, Dispense and Measure, Pause, Save/Load and Print.
The Dispense and Measure step provides the opportunity for simultaneous dispensing and measurement thus enabling detection of fast flash kinetic reactions. The Print step allows automatic printing of raw data or reports after each run and by using the Save/Load step data can be saved to a file or loaded into Ascent Software automatically. With the Pause step, it is possible to set up Ascent Software to communicate with other systems, e.g. a barcode reader for importing of Plate ID’s. The system access password and the session specific password provide security for multi-user laboratories and clinical laboratories.
Results desktop
The extremely flexible Results Desktop is built as a familiar spreadsheet environment. In addition to the comprehensive built in automatic calculations, the function tool can be used to perform basically any custom-made calculations.
Ascent Software provides automatic blank subtraction and automatic reduction of data consisting of several measurement points per well (large wells). In addition, Ascent software provides a possibility to automatically subtract a measurement raw data sheet from another (e.g. dual measurements) or divide two measurement raw data sheets by one another. Ascent Software contains an automatic quantitative Curve Fit tool with 10 different fit types: linear regression (LLS), linear regression (SVD), quadratic polynomial, cubic polynomial, quartic polynomial, point to point, cubic spline, log-logit, four parameter logistics and sigmoid logistics. Using the Curve Fit tool the user can decide which calibrator points to include in the graph and the fit calculations. The Curve Fit tool also provides a possibility to perform automatic ED50 –calculations. It is also possible to add qualitative interpretations to the created Curve Fit sheet.
With Ascent Software, qualitative Cut-Off analysis using the built in Cut-Off tool can also be performed automatically. The Cut-Off tool allows definition of up to four Cut-Off limits with five user definable interpretations. Additionally, Ascent Software has an automatic tool for performing ratio and inhibition calculations. For reduction of kinetic measurement data, Ascent Software provides 11 different kinetic processors, including Maximum Rate, Maximum of Well and Integral. The user can define whether his reaction is increasing or decreasing and the results are calculated accordingly.
Ascent Software also provides an extremely flexible Functions tool for any custom-made calculations and QC equations. Additionally, a powerful Graph tool is available, providing the user the opportunity to present his results as colorful and illustrative graphs and diagrams. These graphs and diagrams can be exported to any word processing program for use in publications and reports. Using the custom-made sheets in Ascent software, any kind of report can be designed as well.
Finally, exporting of any kind of data from Ascent Software to another spreadsheet program is very simple. Data can be copied and pasted directly to other spreadsheet programs and data can also be exported by saving to a file.
Simulation possible
It is also possible to run Ascent Software in simulation mode without having an instrument connected. When Ascent Software is run in simulation mode, measurement data will be generated automatically.
Robotic compatible
Ascent Software has a special Remote Control Interface for robotic use which enables easy integration with robotics and HIS/LIMS systems. Using Ascent Software in Remote mode, predefined assays can be executed remotely by changing files between Ascent Software and the host system.
Hardware and Software requirements
- IBM® PC compatible computer with Pentium® processor
- 64 MB free RAM
- 200 MB free hard disc space
- SVGA display, 1024 x 768
- CD ROM drive
- serial port
- mouse
- Windows 98
- Windows Me
- Windows NT 4.0
- Windows 2000
- Windows XP Professional
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