Featured Article
Monday September 29, 2008
by Catherine Shaffer
Sample management software has become a must-have for large and small laboratories. When you are talking about precious resources and valuable person hours, it is no longer acceptable to keep track of samples by memory, or by a piece of paper scotch-taped to the front of the freezer. Sample management software is available to meet many different needs and requirements. Most of these programs are very flexible, and have similar features, so the main determinant is going to be budget, keeping in mind whether your laboratory can manage with a fairly simple system for just a few users, or a system with a lot of bells and whistles.
There is a consensus among users and developers that configurability is the most important aspect of any sample management system. This is because no laboratory will have perfectly consistent sample storage needs over time. The software should offer multiple fields that can be customized by the administrator, so that today's tissue culture samples don't have to be shoehorned into a system configured for last year's molecular biology samples. Other considerations are ease of use, the ability to interface with other systems or input/export data to those systems, security, and regulatory compliance.
One of the patriarchs of the sample management scene is Freezerworks, from Dataworks Development. Freezerworks had its origins with the AIDS Clinical Trials Group (ACTG) with the University of Washington retroviral group in 1987. The retrovirology labs that were running the project needed to keep track of clinical samples for trials and for long term testing. The freezer inventory program developed by Dataworks morphed into the standalone Freezerworks program in 1992, and has continued to evolve and update with the times.
Freezerworks keeps track of samples in freezers, and stores them in a searchable database with a set of user-defined tags. In a typical workflow, a clinic will enter information from clinic samples in advance, and then have printed bar code labels ready for when the blood samples are drawn. The same scheme can be used with virtually any sample set, for example: tissue samples, DNA, RNA, microorganisms, environmental samples, museum samples, etc. Samples can then be stored long term and retrieved for more studies later. This becomes increasingly relevant as the clinical focus shifts from therapeutics to a combination of therapeutics and biomarkers. Disease research consortia increasingly maintain banks of patient samples hoping to couple outcome data with prognostic biomarkers and other long-term information.
Dataworks focuses on configurability, not customization, to optimize the software for its customers. Rick Michels, vice president for customer relations at Dataworks Development, explains: "We try to write software so that the end user doesn't have to call us every time a change has to be made. We're always willing to work with them and we'll customize when necessary, but we're trying to give the power to the end user to configure the program ... customization can be very expensive down the road. Configurability travels better as operating systems change and upgrades are necessary."
CryoTrack offers a server application for sample management, compatible with Oracle, Windows, or SQL-Server. All of the files are stored at a central location on a server. On the desktop, there is a shortcut to the files located on the server. Many users can log in at the same time to access the data, manipulating samples and data through a graphical user interface. CryoTrack boasts seven data sets to accommodate different types of samples within one institution. The data field vocabulary is controlled by an administrator, to cut down on typographical errors and alternate spellings that might otherwise bury a valuable sample, making it inaccessible to searchers.
The GUI (graphical user interface) makes it easy for new users to get up to speed, or to come back to the system after an absence. "It's like riding a bicycle," says Madhu Sanjanwala, PhD, president of CryoTrack. Additionally, to mitigate the otherwise potentially chaotic effect of having multiple users on the system simultaneously, managing large number of samples, CryoTrack includes a security feature that only allows the sample's creator to modify the data unless permission is given to specific users.
Sampleware software from Biomatrica is geared toward users with more basic needs. Like Freezerworks, Sampleware came out of unmet needs within the company—in this case a desire to offer a sample management solution to customers of their DNA and RNA room temperature storage. Says Brian Baumann, director of software products at Biomatrica, "We saw the frustration. [Customers] wanted something really flexible and easy to use." The outcome was a software package that has the flexibility to interface with other sample handling solutions in the customer's lab, whether it's bar code readers or RFID chips. "The main thing about Sampleware is that you can easily configure it to meet any sample management needs," adds Baumann.
To that end, Biomatrica has partnered with Micronic to develop a protocol for integrating 2D barcode scanners. Micronic makes tube racks where each tube is individually 2D bar-coded on the bottom. The scanners read all 96 or 284 bar codes at one time, and the scanner is integrated into the work flow along with plate readers for high throughput systems.
Biomatrica is planning to bring their system into 21CFRpart11 compliance in 2009 so that they can offer their system to the clinical market. Additionally, they have a beta version of a web-based Sampleware that they are planning to release next year. This could be hosted at the customer site on a web server.
Sample management software reduces an important source of error—human error. There are no paper freezer lists to keep track of, or botched labels, or unlabeled vials (an alarmingly common occurrence in a busy laboratory). It's possible to check on the status of a sample without digging around in the freezer, and it's a labor saver for tasks like aliquoting samples. Innovations like the use of RFID technology can add another layer of security, making it possible to keep track of important or hazardous samples such as anthrax or other infectious agents. And, lastly, server and web-based solutions make it increasingly possible to do sample management "in the cloud," freeing workers from their desktop computer stations.