Patent ID: 8028591

Claim:
A system comprising: at least one retainment region, each retainment region of the at least one retainment region being adapted to retain a respective supply of support beads, each support bead comprising one or more reagents supported thereby, each reagent having a respective concentration with respect to each respective support bead; at least one mixture retainment region; at least one capture device, wherein the at least one capture device comprises a vacuum device and a movable piston in a housing; and a control unit programmed to control the at least one capture device to extract a calculated plurality of support beads from one or more regions of the at least one retainment region, wherein the calculated plurality of support beads is extracted from the at least one retainment region by setting the movable piston with respect to the housing to admit the calculated plurality into the housing under vacuum force supplied by the vacuum device and to control the dispensing of the extracted calculated plurality of support beads into the at least one mixture retainment region.