Patent ID: 7795012

Claim:
A device for carrying out of investigations on living cells, cell cultures and for detection of metabolic activity of the cells, which are located in a liquid medium, the device comprises at least one receptacle for liquid medium along with the cell culture, and wherein one or more measuring apparatuses and/or sensors for measurement of the cell culture are provided and wherein a movable separating element is provided, which confiningly borders a reaction space, the separating element ( 7 , 7 a ) is placed in a measurement position, closely above a cell culture on a bottom of the receptacle to separate a reaction space ( 8 , 8 a ) from a reservoir space wherein a volume of the reservoir space is an order of magnitude greater than a volume of the reaction space ( 8 , 8 a ), and the separating element ( 7 , 7 a ) is movable through one of an essentially vertical up and down motion, from a bottom proximal location, which covers the cell culture and serves as the measurement position, and a bottom distal position, in at least which position, the reservoir ( 14 , 14 a ) is in fluid communication with the reaction space ( 8 , 8 a ), or a forward and back, lateral motion between the measurement position and a position in which the reaction space ( 8 , 8 a ) is in fluid communication with the reservoir ( 14 , 14 a ), the one or more measuring apparatuses and/or sensors comprises at least one sensor that is placed on, or in, the bottom of the receptacle ( 3 a ) and culture areas separated from one another, are formed by application of structured, cell repellent coatings or created by a three dimensional contouring of the bottom with recesses or elevations defining separated areas therebetween, and the culture medium ( 4 ) in the culture areas is respectively present as drops ( 25 ), the bottom of the receptacle is formed by at least one part of at least one wafer upon which the at least one sensor ( 6 ) is provided, and an open top container, is provided as a receptacle ( 3 ), into which the separating element ( 7 ) extends, which divides the space of the entire receptacle ( 3 ) into two space portions, one positioned above the other, and a bottom side space portion forms a small volume reaction space ( 8 ) in comparison to an entire volume of the receptacle ( 3 ) and the other space portion forms a reservoir ( 14 ) and at least one flow channel ( 9 ) is provided, which first, communicates with the reaction space ( 8 ) and second, communicates with the reservoir space ( 14 ) and within the separating element ( 7 ) one or more through-flow channels ( 15 ) are provided, which open into the small volume reaction space ( 8 ) of the receptacle ( 3 ) and/or in the reservoir space ( 14 ) of the receptacle ( 3 ).