Patent ID: 7823535

Claim:
A liquid dispensing apparatus comprising: a dispensing mechanism including a plurality of dispensing devices for dripping a sample or a reagent; an image capturing device for capturing the downward area image; a movable table capable of supporting, on its upper surface, a target object onto which the sample or reagent is to be dispensed and being moved on a horizontal plane surface for positioning the target object at least at a dispensing position beneath the dispensing device and at an image capturing position beneath the image capturing device; a monitoring section for displaying the image captured by the image capturing device; a dispensing position designating section for designating the dispensing position on the target object based on the image of the target object displayed on the monitoring section; a dispensing control section for positioning the target object and the dispensing device relative to each other so that the dispensing position on the target object designated by the dispensing position designating section is placed beneath the dispensing device, which performs the dispensing operation, of the dispensing mechanism and for controlling the dispensing operation of the dispensing mechanism; the image capturing device for photographing the tip end of the dispensing device; and a moving mechanism for moving the image capturing device in association with the switching of the dispensing device performing the dispensing operation so that the image capturing device is capable of photographing the tip end of the dispensing device performing the dispensing operation.