Synbiosis, a world-leading manufacturer of automated microbiological imaging solutions is pleased to announce that for viral vaccine testing, the ProtoCOL automated zone reader and colony counter has been proven to produce fast and accurate results.

In a study to measure the potency of three different flu vaccines, researchers at a prestigious medicines testing institute compared Synbiosis's ProtoCOL system with a manual method for measuring reaction zones on single radial immunodiffusion (SRD) assay plates. This is a standard test to determine potency of many viral vaccines. The researchers found that the system produced rapid, reproducible results when compared to its manual method of measurement.

The Synbiosis ProtoCOL is suited to this type of vaccine testing because its CCD camera can transfer an image of an SRD plate to a computer, where the ProtoCOL's software automatically measures the diameter of reaction zones and transfers the data produced into an Excel spreadsheet.