Patent ID: 7638337

Claim:
A system for agitating the contents of at least one container, said system comprising: a turntable structure constructed and arranged to be rotatable about a first axis of rotation; one or more container holders, each container holder being constructed and arranged to hold a container therein; a container holder mounting assembly associated with each container holder, said container holder mounting assembly being constructed and arranged to mount said associated container holder to said turntable structure and to permit said associated container holder to rotate about a second axis of rotation that is generally parallel to and spaced from said first axis of rotation, wherein said first and second axes of rotation have vertical orientations; rotational motion coupling elements operatively associated with said turntable structure and each container holder mounting assembly and constructed and arranged to cause each container holder to rotate about said second axis of rotation as said turntable structure rotates about said first axis of rotation; one or more containers, each container being operationally positioned with respect to one of said container holders and containing a solid support material in a fluid medium, wherein each container consists of a cylindrical inner wall and a bottom wall; and a computer controller programmed to control the rotational movement of said turntable structure, wherein the movement of each container is limited to the rotations of said turntable structure and said container holder about their respective axes of rotation, and whereby the corresponding rotational movement of each container holder agitates the contents of each associated container to thereby maintain the solid support material of each associated container in suspension in said fluid medium.