Rachel Oefelein, MS 15 min

Demo: Enhancing Workflow Efficiency-DNA Labs International's Integration of Innovative Technologies


This presentation highlights how DNA Labs International has successfully leveraged cutting-edge technologies, including the HID NIMBUS Presto System, SeqStudio Flex Genetic Analyzer, and GeneMapper ID-X Software v1.7 software, to optimize their workflow efficiency and increase productivity. The HID NIMBUS Presto System enables rapid DNA purification, significantly reducing processing time. Looking forward, implementing the recently released quantification setup, normalization, and amplification setup capabilities will skyrocket the abilities of this instrument even further. The SeqStudio Flex Genetic Analyzer offers enhanced flexibility and scalability, allowing for high-quality genetic analysis with increased throughput. GeneMapper ID-X Software v1.7 provides advanced data analysis capabilities, with new tools that allow DNA analysts to work more effectively. By integrating these advanced technologies, DNA Labs International has experienced a significant improvement in their workflow efficiency. The streamlined processes have expedited laboratory processing, improving productivity. Additionally, the improvements to the organization's throughput allows for the ability to accept more cases. This presentation will delve into the specific benefits of each technology, discussing the impact on various stages of the workflow, such as sample preparation, genetic analysis, and result interpretation. Furthermore, it will address the challenges faced during the internal validation and implementation process and the strategies employed to overcome them. Learn more about the potential of these innovative technologies and their transformative effects on DNA analysis laboratories. DNA Labs International's success story serves as a valuable example for other forensic laboratories seeking to optimize their workflow efficiency and improve overall operational effectiveness.



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[Music]

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[Music]

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I'm Rachel Aifling, Chief Scientific Officer at DNA Labs International.

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Welcome to Deerfield Beach in sunny South Florida,

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home base to our 100+ employees all throughout the United States.

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Let's take a peek inside where I can show you the newest technology

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we're using to help law enforcement solve crime.

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[Music]

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Hi, my name is Allison Nunes. I'm the President and Laboratory Director here at

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DNA Labs International.

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I've been here for over 13 years and always been involved in the forensic

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community.

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My dad was a DNA analyst growing up nearby at the Broward Sheriff's Office.

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It was an important part of our family life, you know, helping solve crimes.

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And in 2004 they decided that they would start a private lab

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to help support the growing need for DNA testing.

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At the time before 2004 the backlogs were mounting all over the country.

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And even my dad would say that if my sister and I were raped they could solve

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our case for two years.

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So as a mother my mom was very concerned about that, but as an entrepreneur she

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was like maybe we can help.

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So she started the lab in an effort to try to support the rising crime rates

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and DNA testing across the country.

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We primarily work with law enforcement and we do also serve a lot of government

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laboratories as well as some attorney cases.

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And some of my favorite are historical or research cases which can be really

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fun too.

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I like all the variety of things that we get to do. We have all kinds of cases

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that come in homicides, property crimes,

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cold cases, those are some of my favorite to work.

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There's always something new and no case is the same.

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When we started the lab it was to be supporting local agencies here in Florida

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and actually in the Caribbean.

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A lot of the samples that we got are simply going to be swabs from sexual

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assault kits or from firearms.

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We do get a lot more unique things as well though. We've got a uterine wash

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from a horse before, some hair from a sink trap.

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So we really see a lot of things. Our specialty really is just our quality and

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efficiency.

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We have a technician based system. So that means instead of having one analyst

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take the case from start to finish,

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we have one individual who's going to be doing one part of the processing for

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all the cases.

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So we'll have someone who's focused on quantitation for the day and they might

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process 90 cases

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or an individual's focused on amplification for that day.

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And really that makes us operate in the most efficient way possible so that we

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can be a very high throughput laboratory.

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As the technical leader, I look at all of the throughput from the laboratory

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and look at numbers all the time and see how many cases

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we have going through and what would be easier for the analyst and what would

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make us more efficient.

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In a single day we're going to process hundreds of samples. We process tens of

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thousands of samples every year.

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We're very, very busy. Sexual assault kits alone, we're doing hundreds of kits

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every single month.

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So really it keeps us on our toes and that's why it's so important for us to

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have high efficiency in our laboratory

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so that we can continue to accept more case work.

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The sexual assault kit funding was an impactful part of being able to expand

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our company,

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but we really, it's only about 40% of our business. So we do a lot of current

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homicide cases.

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We're really called a lot of times to do stuff within 24 to 48 hours with

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agencies.

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So when it's critical for them, we do want to be available to be able to get a

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violent offender off the street as fast as possible.

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And then we continue to grow and as we bring on new technology, it helps us

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harness all the types of cases

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and we work every type of violent crime, property crimes. They're very, very

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high volume. Sexual assaults are also high volume.

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So a lot of the instrumentation that we're bringing online now addresses the

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high volume need,

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increasing our liquid handling capabilities and automation that allows us to

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process more samples at once.

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We strive to have the newest of everything and are constantly innovating new

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technology as well

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so that we can offer all the services needed to help bring closure in some of

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these cases.

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As chief scientific officer, my primary role is going to be evaluate new

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technologies

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and decide if that's a technology we want to bring online here at the

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laboratory.

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If we do want to bring that online, when are we going to bring it online?

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So should it be this year or next year or maybe five years down the road?

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And we've made a lot of changes this year, kind of all at once.

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So with the purchase of the SIK Studio Flex as well as the HID Nimbus Presto,

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we're really eyes forward to efficiency and innovation.

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Automation is really key to being efficient in the laboratory.

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However, it was time for a little bit of an upgrade on some of our automated

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systems,

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so we're very excited to have these new platforms of technology.

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Hi, my name is Brittany Sturmell. My title is QA Laboratory Processing

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Specialist.

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I'm DNA analyst and training. I've been here at DLI for the last six years.

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My current specialty, I think, would be the robotics.

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I'm a lot of hands-on with our HID Nimbus Presto system.

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My first experience was last year when we got it installed.

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They brought me in to assist with that, and it was very easy to use, very

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simple.

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It's really sped up our process. It's definitely cut down the processing time

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and almost half from our current use on the T-Can.

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The HID Nimbus Presto is already showing a big impact on our efficiency.

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It cut down our extraction time using the PrEP filers system by several hours

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already.

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So that means more hours for our analysts and our technicians to be able to

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process in additional cases.

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It also means we're able to get those cases more quickly out the door and back

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to our clients

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so that they have the tools that they need to continue on with their

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investigation.

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The learning curve was very small. It made it real easy to get started.

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The scripts were already there. There wasn't a lot of work on R&D that we had

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to do. We just kind of followed what was there, and we were ready to go.

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Not a lot of changing, not a lot of testing. They did a lot of that for us.

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And so for us, it was plug and play. We were ready to go.

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The validation for us was really easy because it's more of a material

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modification

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because we already run the PrEP filer system here on our T-Can.

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We really just had to take that process and see if the Nimbus could give us the

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same results as the T-Can,

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which it did, and it only took us maybe two weeks.

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It was really up to our efficiency here in the lab.

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We're able to do two runs of the PrEP filer system in a day, if we would like,

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and therefore we're getting more samples out and more cases out to our clients.

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My overall impression is that it's great, super fast, super cool looking too.

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When I saw it, I was like, "This is probably the coolest instrument I've ever

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seen."

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And the fact that it's just a speedy process, helps us get stuff done in a time

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-efficient manner

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and get great results.

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Our turnaround time was anywhere from two weeks as a fastest to months,

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depending on how many cases we're coming in.

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And now we can offer a 24-hour turnaround time.

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If someone needs it, that's how fast we can get you corded, missable results.

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When the Seek Studio Flex first arrived at our laboratory,

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my first impression was how beautiful the instrument is.

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Normally with our genetic analyzers in the past,

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you would have an instrument and it would always come with a computer on the

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side.

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This has it all integrated into one and is very modern and updated-looking.

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The Seek Studio Flex has the ability to load four plates on the deck at the

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same time.

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This doubles our capacity because previously we were only loading two at one

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time.

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The other interesting thing is it has a drawer function where you can pull out

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the drawer and load plates while the instrument is still running.

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This is really helpful because you can have multiple people loading on that

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instrument

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at different points of the day.

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You could continuously be putting plates on.

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This is also really helpful if you have a rush type situation

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where you have a case that needs to be processed immediately.

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You don't have to wait to load plates on until that rush is through

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because you can add it to the instrument at any point in time.

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The capillary array for the Seek Studio Flex is much more sturdy than some of

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the previous capillary arrays

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that we've dealt with.

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Previously we were worried about bending or snapping the array

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because it was very fragile and then they've made it much sturdier,

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which makes our lives easier, and also makes it faster

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because we're not as worried about doing it more slowly to make sure the cap

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illary doesn't break, unfortunately.

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In addition, there's an auto-spectral function, which is great

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because a lot of time is spent doing spectrals and making sure they look nice

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and neat in order to produce the best quality data.

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So the auto-spectral function keeps us from having to do spectrals

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and adjust them over and over again.

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We do have the Flex connected to our local area network.

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This is really important because any analyst at our company, no matter what

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time of day,

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can always connect in and remote into the actual instrument

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in order to look at that data.

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We as a private laboratory have analysts all around the country

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and many aren't here on site, so that really provides a great flexibility

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for those analysts to keep analyzing data even after, you know, business hours

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if needed.

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So with the Flex, you will be using G-Mapper IDX, version 1.7.

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The software looks great.

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It's more user-friendly, very easy to use.

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It has a number of great updates, which I'm very excited to start using when

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analyzing my data.

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Some of my top benefits that I see with G-Mapper version 1.7

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is the ability to put notes on the actual electrophirogram.

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Previously, we would have to print to PDF and then append notes

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to the actual PDF documents with number of contributors,

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with any edits we wanted to do, with any interpretations that we wanted to make

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Now you can do that just in G-Mapper and it automatically prints those notes

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on the electrophirograms for you.

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One of the other neat things about this software

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is it actually displays on each dye channel what the analytical threshold is.

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Every laboratory has a different analytical threshold.

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We have many kits online, so there's no way that our analysts can memorize

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all of those thresholds, especially when you have a different one for each dye

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channel.

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And then lastly, one of my favorite features is that you can have several

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projects

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open at the same time.

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Previously, you would have to open a project, analyze the data,

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and then you would close it in order to open another project.

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Now you can have them open at the same time in open e-grams

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from those projects to directly compare to one another.

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One other cool thing is now there's an autosave function as well.

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This is really important because if your project freezes

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and you're in the middle of analyzing it, it will have saved

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so you don't have to go back and reanalyze from scratch if you had forgotten to

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save previously.

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Part of the new GeneMapper IDX version 1.7 is it moved to the new database.

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And that seems to make everything faster and more stable as well.

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This is very important, especially when we have big projects that we're

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analyzing. We don't want to lose connection with the database and lose the ability to

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capture

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any of those edits.

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We need to redo that work because we're very focused on efficiency.

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We want to do it as quickly as possible while obviously maintaining the highest

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level of quality.

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So that move to that database was really important for that reason.

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The Seek Studio Flex has the ability to load more plates.

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We can also load plates while the instrument is running.

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So anytime you're able to basically double your throughput,

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that's going to affect the amount of data coming through.

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With GeneMapper version 1.7, we have new tools at our disposal

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that will really help our analysts kind of streamline their analysis and

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interpretation and make the whole process a lot faster.

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So efficiency in our lab is very important to us and is why we are able to

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process so many samples

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every year and continuing to grow.

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To me, efficiency goes hand in hand with quality.

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Quality is extremely important in forensics.

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It is the most important.

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So once you bring on instrumentation that is high quality

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and it allows you to have the efficiency, that's ideal.

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That's what you're looking for.

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For the future of DLI, I just see us continuing to evolve and innovate

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and that means keeping our eyes on what's new in technology that's coming

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online,

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how we can operate the best, how we can be the most efficient and get the

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highest quality results

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and how can we do that quickly to bring answers for law enforcement

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so that we can help try to keep our community safe.

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Efficiency to me means the ability to produce high quality work at a fast rate.

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So there's always the balance between the amount of work and the quality

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and both are equally as important.

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One of my coworkers always says slow is smooth and smooth is fast

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and these new tools are really going to help us to be able to smooth out the

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whole process

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and make sure we're producing high quality work

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while also producing the best output that we can.

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You want that synergy, you want the quality and then you want the efficiency

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and from there everything is golden.

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Did you know that you could resolve up to 70% of your tech support cases in

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minutes and not days?

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If you connect your Seek Studio Flex genetic analyzer to the Thermo Fisher

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Connect platform,

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you can access its smart help interface.

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Let me show you how simple this is.

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Here on the plate screen you press actions, then support, then smart help,

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and you'll see two choices, technical support and instrument service.

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With the touch of a few more buttons, you'll be connected to online technical

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experts who can help you.

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From there, you can share log and run files securely to speed up troubles

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hooting

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and if it's needed, you can also schedule a service visit.

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(guitar chords)