Automated System for Plant Tissue Culture and Transformation

This Request for Proposal (RFP) from the University of California, for the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), seeks proposals for the development of an automated system for plant tissue culture and transformation. The system should be capable of identifying, selecting, and removing embryogenic portions of plant calluses, placing them on fresh media, and tracking their growth and health. Key requirements include the ability to work with biomass crops such as sorghum, miscanthus, and switchgrass, achieve a minimum of 75% callus regeneration, and manipulate at least 10,000 calluses per day, with scalability to 50,000-500,000 calluses per day in the long term. Desirable features include automated sampling for assays, media refreshing capabilities, interoperability with other robotics systems, and minimization of human intervention. The project aims to accelerate crop engineering and strengthen U.S. supply chains by improving efficiency and reducing costs in plant transformation processes.