Patch clamp asks the electrode to stay stable and drift-free for many hours. Conventional manipulators are often too sensitive to vibration and thermal drift to keep a gigaseal intact that long, and every lost seal is a lost experiment.
The MM3A-LS is compact and stiff, with a high resonance frequency that makes it far less susceptible to the building and rig vibrations that spoil recordings. Its sub-nanometre resolution lets you make the final approach to the membrane gently and reproducibly, and its low drift keeps the pipette where you left it, raising the success rate of prolonged recordings.
Because the manipulator is small and mounts close to the bath, several can work around one preparation, and the tool exchanges quickly between pipette holders and other plug-ins.
