Hot TopicYour Partner with a Finger on the Pulse

Pharma

Safe handling of sensi­tive substances during the produc­tion of phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals

An appli­ca­tion at Ster­i­line

Ster­i­line is an Italian company founded in 1989, which manu­fac­tures machines for the aseptic pack­aging of injectable drugs. In addi­tion to mechan­ical solu­tions, Ster­i­line relies primarily on automa­tion. A SCHUNK SWS change system and various pneu­matic grip­pers, such as PGN-plus, DPG-plus, PSH or MPG-plus, are used for fully auto­mated prepa­ra­tion of drugs.

These reli­ably handle various containers such as syringes, glass vials or IV bags during different process steps. Depending on the require­ments and task, the robot flex­ibly changes to the appro­priate tool. This enables Steriline’s customers to manu­fac­ture small and medium-sized series.

Medical Devices

Everyday medical aids for human beings

An appli­ca­tion at Lambda Health System SA

Swiss company Lambda Health has devel­oped a robotic assis­tance system that helps patients with neuro­log­ical diseases retrain the muscu­loskeletal system and strengthen lower limb muscles.

Patients sit in an armchair and place their feet on pedals equipped with SCHUNK FTN-AXIA80 sensors. The sensors precisely measure how much force the patient is exerting during the workout and passes the data to the soft­ware. During this process, the training success is docu­mented and neces­sary adjust­ments are recom­mended.

Lambda bene­fits in partic­ular from the sensors’ small measure­ment reso­lu­tion of 0.1 N, the low measure­ment uncer­tainty of just 2% and the high over­load protec­tion offered by the FTN-AXIA80. Over­load protec­tion is impor­tant because, depending on the patient, the loads on the sensors also regu­larly exceed the actual spec­i­fi­ca­tions of 30 — 40 kilo­grams.

MedTech

Manu­fac­ture of prod­ucts for the preven­tion and therapy of diseases

An appli­ca­tion at BW-Tec

The BW-Tec company from Switzer­land builds machines for the produc­tion of balloon catheters. These catheters are used in various vessels in the human body, such as the arteries around the heart. Blocked or narrowed blood vessels are dilated from the inside, thus restoring blood flow. For almost two decades, BW-Tec has relied on SCHUNK’s PGN-plus universal grip­pers for its produc­tion, due to the grip­pers clean­room certi­fi­ca­tion which is essen­tial for medical devices of this type.

During the produc­tion of the balloon catheters from a plastic tube, no cont­a­m­i­nants may get into the product — after all, the finished catheters are later inserted into bodies. The SCHUNK grip­pers also provide BW-Tec with the neces­sary reli­a­bility. During the forming process, the hose must be reli­ably fixed so that the lateral tensile forces can be opti­mally trans­ferred to the product. Due to its clamping force of 250 N and ability to main­tain grip­ping force, the PGN-plus can meet these require­ments.

Lab Automa­tion

Automa­tion of labo­ra­tory processes for quality assur­ance and accel­er­a­tion of work­flows

An appli­ca­tion at Femitec

Femitec is a builder of special machines that has devel­oped a labo­ra­tory cell with two robots that is unique to date. It handles plastic tubes containing COVID-19 PCR tests fully auto­mat­i­cally. The samples in the tubes are analyzed in the labo­ra­tory for the genetic make-up of the SARS-CoV‑2 virus. For handling, Femitec opted for the clean­room-certi­fied gripper for small compo­nents SCHUNK EGP 64 with IO-Link.

Due to its kine­matics, it handles the differ­ently sized, malleable tubes absolutely reli­ably with constant grip­ping force throughout the entire process. In addi­tion, the new Soft­Grip soft­ware, which is now inte­grated as a stan­dard func­tion, ensures gentle handling of the deli­cate tubes.

A total of five EGP 64 IOLs are used in the robotic cell — three handle the tubes, two grip­pers hold the screw cap, while a rotary unit unscrews and closes the tube for sampling.