Patent ID: 8716015

Claim:
A method of inoculating and maintaining a culture medium, the method comprising: (a) providing a droplet actuator comprising a sample droplet loaded thereon, wherein the sample droplet is substantially surrounded by an oil filler fluid and comprises cells of multiple cell types; (b) dispensing by electrowetting a sub-droplet from the sample droplet; (c) analyzing the sub-droplet to determine whether the sub-droplet comprises a single cell type; (d) repeating steps (b) and (c) until one or more sub-droplets each comprising a single cell type is identified; and (e) inoculating a culture medium droplet on the droplet actuator by executing electrowetting-mediated droplet operations with a sub-droplet of (c) or (d) comprising a single cell type to bring the sub-droplet into contact with the culture medium droplet to form an inoculated droplet; and (f) maintaining the inoculated droplet of (e) at a temperature suitable for causing the cells to grow in the inoculated droplet surrounded by the oil on the droplet actuator, and thereby causing the cells to grow.