qTOWER
3
touch/qTOWER
3
G touch Function and setup
15
3 Function and setup
The qTOWER³ touch combines a PCR thermocycler with a patented fluorescence pho-
tometer. The stand-alone system is fully controlled from the integrated 10” tablet PC
using the program qPCRsoft touch.
Upper part with fluores-
cence photometer
Heated lid
Sample block
Thermal cycler
Fig. 1 Layout of the qTOWER³ touch
3.1 Fluorescence spectrometer
An 8-channel Epi fluorescence photometer with fiber -multiplexer and mechanical
scanning device is used as detection system.
Light for exciting the dyes is emitted by four long-life LEDs in blue, green, white and
red. The light is passed through optic fibers to collimator lenses, bundled and then
transferred to the excitation filter of the color modules fitted to a rotating filter wheel.
The light is deflected via a beam divider and passed through additional optic fibers to a
lens array in a shuttle system scanning the sample block in columns. The light excites
the fluorescence dyes in the reaction mix. The fluorescence dyes then emit a light of
longer wavelength that is bundled through the lenses in the shuttle system and passed
via the optic fibers back to the color modules. In the color modules the light passes the
beam divider followed by two emission filters and is then transferred to the photomul-
tiplier (CPM) for detection.
The filter wheel of the photometer can be populated freely with a choice of color filter
modules. In addition, color filter modules can be retrofitted at any time, extending the
application spectrum of the device. A total of 12 color filter modules are available. This
also includes filter modules especially optimized for FRET applications. You can chose
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