Patent ID: 7585463

Claim:
A microarrayer assembly for depositing minute droplets of fluid on a substrate comprising: a deposit element for depositing minute droplets of fluid onto a surface of a substrate; a substrate holder support; and a removable substrate-holder for holding at least one substrate, the substrate-holder comprising a means for precisely and repeatably positioning the substrate-holder on the substrate-holder support, wherein the means comprises a datum plane defined by at least three datums: a first datum for engaging the substrate-holder and for restricting movement of the substrate-holder along an x-axis and a mutually orthogonal y-axis, and defining a first point in a z-axis, the z-axis mutually orthogonal to the x-axis and the y-axis; a second datum for engaging the substrate-holder and for at least partially locating the substrate-holder along at least one of the x-axis and the y-axis and defining a second point in the z-axis; and a third datum for engaging the substrate-holder and defining a third point in the z-axis.