Sustainable Plastics - November/December 2023 - 20

sustainable packaging
Sustainable packaging
solutions for immunoassay
analyzer consumables
In May 2023, Beckman Coulter Diagnostics, a global leader in clinical diagnostics,
unveiled its DxI 9000 Access Immunoassay (IA) Analyzer, a next-generation
analyzer that addresses clinical laboratories' need for analytical speed, reliability,
reproducibility, quality and menu expansion. Everything on this new instrument
was engineered with the most advanced technologies to maximise performance
and optimise resources, including the packaging of the DxI 9000 analyzer's related
consumable products. A case study by Mohammad Rafi and Rob Helmke
Fig. 2 Thermoforming
machine (Courtesy of
Plastic Ingenuity)
Fig. 1 Packaged
pipette tips (Courtesy
of Beckman Coulter)
A
20
critical single-use
consumable product
for the DxI 9000
analyzer is the highly
sensitive polypropylene (PP)
pipette tip. This pipette collects
a patient's sample from a test
tube and dispenses it into the
analyzer. This critical step requires
pipettes to remain undamaged
to ensure the quality
of the analysis. The Beckman
Coulter Diagnostics Global
Plastics Team needed a packaging
solution seamlessly integrated
with the DxI 9000 IA
analyzer, minimising material
content and capitalising on recycling
opportunities.
Beckman Coulter approached
Plastic Ingenuity (PI) to partner
on designing a custom thermoformed
package to hold and
protect 520 pipette tips in four
rigid polystyrene trays
Thermoforming process:
overcoming the design
challenge
The thermoforming process
differs from the injection
moulding process. It is a manuNovember/December
2023
facturing process where a plastic
sheet or film is heated in an
oven to a high enough temperature
so that it can be stretched
into a mould that is formed and
cooled to a specific finished
shape in a mould (or die) and
trimmed to create a usable
product. Thin-gauge thermoforming
(Fig. 2) is primarily used
to manufacture containers, lids,
trays, blisters and clamshells
for the food, medical and general
retail industries. To protect
the highly sensitive pipette tips
from handling damage, PI designed
a unique cover and base
tray to be as robust as possible
yet remain a viable thermoformed
PET part.
First, a prototype tool was
built for the initial fit, form and
functionality trials. To optimise
the design and instead of simply
adding material, PI initiated a
DFM approach and focused on
design features such as adding
ribs, flutes and structure to both
the cover and base trays that
increased the overall package
strength without compromising
the design intent. Subsequently,
a production thermoforming
tool was designed and built for
production purposes incorporating
the lessons learned from
the prototype tool. In discussions
with Beckman Coulter's
Global Plastics Team, the PI
team incorporated a cut-out
feature to the package's base
tray, allowing laboratory techs
and operators to easily reach
inside the package when loading
the individual pipette trays
into the instrument. These
Sustainable Plastics - November/December 2023

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